Till Death Do Us Part
by madeofpurestarlightwrites
Summary: "Effie and Haymitch's marriage doesn't really differ from any other seven years long marriage. They got together young and stayed together through both worse and better, and now they're slowly drifting apart. And like all married people, they have their secrets, and it turns out they might not know each other as well as they thought - at all. Hayffie Mr. & Mrs. Smith AU"
1. Chapter 1

_"Effie and Haymitch's marriage doesn't really differ from any other seven years long marriage. They got together young and stayed together through both worse and better, and now they're slowly drifting apart. And like all married people, they have their secrets, and it turns out they might not know each other as well as they thought - at all. | Hayffie Mr. & Mrs. Smith AU"_

 **Disclaimer:** All characters except for the original ones belong to Suzanne Collins. Unfortunately.

* * *

 **Chapter I.**

 _i._

The bar was filled with smoke, loud people and the promise of a long night.

Haymitch was leaning with his back against the counter, slowly finishing his second whiskey. His eyes wandered around every few seconds, occasionally meeting with the eyes of a short-haired woman sitting in the box opposite him across the room, then continued to observe the surroundings warily. Everybody was wasted, shouting something inarculate, ordering more shots. There was a live broadcast of a third-league baseball match on TV - Midland versus Pittsfield, only paid attention to by die-hard fans who were arguing over the score. Things could get quite lively on a Friday evening here, he mused. This one-horse-town in North Carolina wasn't a place you'd go for a vacation to, but it was a good place for different kinds of things.

If everything went according to the plan, he'd be done here soon. All of his senses were working in the way only a trained person's could, combined with effortless pretending that he was just like most of the people here, enjoying a Friday night like anyone else, hiding here away from his responsibilities, problems or angry wife for a drink or two, to watch the baseball game and to clear his head. He didn't really have a night like this in a long time and he almost gave in to his own game - he almost relaxed himself, entertaining himself with what was going on on the TV screen, enjoying the whiskey sliding down his throat and numbing him in all the right ways.

Bars like these reminded him of the early years of this. Just Chaff and him after a succesful action, and booze and long nights out in the streets of the city they were currently in. Sometimes it would be Stockholm, sometimes it would be Tokio, sometimes it would be some godforsaken town in the middle of Arkansas, and that was what made it so special. You never knew where the night was gonna end, though most of the time it would be a strange hotel room with a girl he couldn't remember picking up the night before by his side, tangled up in weirdly stained sheets and lying on his arm in such position so there was no way for him to escape, and he had to wait until she woke up, then face the awkward hangover talk before saying even more akward goodbye and looking for Chaff everywhere, before finding him sleeping on the sofa in the lobby- well, that was one version of how the night would end, and it didn't always have the same process and it didn't always end up in them puking out of the taxi cab on their way to their place. There were some pretty good nights, too. Or ones that would LEAD to something good.

Somebody walked in, a gaunt young man in a baseball cap and a navy blue nylon jacket that appeared almost black in the gloom with the number three on his back, and made his way through the crowded room to the bar. Haymitch turned around and waved at the bartender, a tall, young guy with greasy black hair drying a wine glass. "Sorry," said Haymitch quietly and placed a twenty dollar banknote on the counter, "I'll pay."

"Good, so it's two whiskeys and a soda," named the boy and took the money, counting in his head quickly.

"Keep the change," replied Haymitch mind-lessly, side-eyeing the man in the blue jacket who ordered a vodka from the other bartender and leant in, urgently whispering something into his ear. The bartender slowly nodded and then disappeared in the staff room, returning only seconds later with a key he discreetly passed to him on the counter. The man grunted something in response and walked over to the rear exit, nobody really paying attention to him because a Midland player just striked a point and everybody started either cheering or grumbling, totally focused on the Pittsfield couch yelling something at the catcher who got into a heated argument with the rival's pitcher - a messy scene that caused enough havoc in the pub for the man to get lost without anyone giving a care.

Haymitch took the chance at stealthily following the man as the whole room roared, waiting a few moments before walking out into the warm spring night as well.

The metal door closed heavily, echoing in the night's peaceful quiet and the man turned around with a startled look plastered in his milky pale, zit-covered face. "Wha- what are you doing?" he stuttered in a strong Russian accent.

"I got an invitation from a friend."

"You know about the club?" The man frowned suspiciously, slowly eyeing him up and down, probably looking for a gun or a recorder or something. The hesitation in his voice gave Haymitch a certain advantage.

"Ask Alan." Very few people, and certainly not this kid, knew that Alan Whitfield was shot somewhere in Arizona several weeks ago, and nobody seemed to care. Chaff had been keeping an eye on this group for a few weeks. He was better at this than Haymitch, he had patience and people skills, and less hit-and-go tendencies.

The Russian guy glared at him for one more second, then shrugged. "I'm Nestor."

"Hayden," he said quickly but convicingly, and he could almost hear Johanna laughing in his head.

Nestor finally melted and beckoned at him, walking in the opposite direction. Haymitch followed, keeping his distance a few feet behind him. The pub was located on the Main Street of Lancaster, a small town in Greensboro suburbs. It neighbored with a hairdresser's and a closed gym from the sides and old public garages from behind, forming a cobbled square-shaped backyard with tufts of grass growing between the tiles, that apparently lost its intended purpose of a nice summer seating and was now a dumping ground, judging from the barrells and tires and broken furniture carelessly scattered around. The garages were long abandoned and now served as the perfect meeting spot for all the cranks of the town.

They stopped in front of one of them, Nestor shakily bringing the key he got from the bartender to the locker on the rear entrance to the garage. Through the narrow, curtained windows shone a thin stripe of fluorescent light. The Russian unlocked, gifting Haymitch with one last uncertain attempt. "I really should not be doing this."

That guy wasn't the brightest person here, and Haymitch couldn't lose time. The cell phone in the inner pocket of his jacket vibrated, and he bit his lip to supress a groan. He knew who it was without having to look.

"They're in this garage," pointed Nestor out uselessly in resignation, and pushed the door open, allowing Haymitch to walk in first, then closing it behind them and locking it again.

Three pairs of eyes fixated on him. Their owners were sitting around a large round table in the corner of the room, three other chairs empty. The ingratiating smell of liquor and cigars lingered in the air heavy with smoke, and Nestor shuffled next to him, waiting who was going to ask first what this was supposed to mean.

"Who's that?" A rough-voiced man in his early fifties broke the silence first. He was holding a glass of burbon in fat calloused fingers, and from beneath his furry eyebrows stared at Haymitch with empty, dark eyes.

"This is Hayden," explained Nestor, nervously playing with the sleeve of his blue jacket. "He says Alan invited him along."

Three men raised their brows. "Alan hasn't showed up in a month, if not more."

"How come?" asked Haymitch dumbly.

One of the men, holding a cigar in his right hand, since he kind of lacked the left one, shrugged. "We don't know. He probably got echo from someone."

"You bet your ass he's in Tijuana by now," the third man chipped in.

The old man put down his glass, tapping on the empty seat next to him. "Sit down. I'm Harry, by the way. This," he waved towards the other two men, "is Joe and Mac."

"Hey." He sat down to them, Nestor following, but the guy named Harry snorted.

"I don't think so, boy," said Harry, jerking his head towards the exit. "This is a private party."

Haymitch shot Nestor a sympathetic look as the kid slowly unlocked the door, slipped into the darkness and then they heard the rustlling of the key in the locker again. He was almost glad that Nestor wasn't here.

"Drink?" asked Harry, lifting a bottle of whiskey in an offering gesture.

"No, thanks."

"Cigar?"

"Don't smoke."

"I hope you know how to play poker."

"Kinda."

Haymitch watched Mac as he emptied his glass, probably not his first this evening, and began to mix cards in one hand with surprising practice. While he was handing them out, the door opened again, and it wasn't Nestor. This guy was tall, chunky and had shoulder-long brown hair, in interesting contrast with his deep blue suit. He could just be a hippie-gone-wrong executive officer, or a lawyer you wouldn't choose to represent you with a gun at your temple, but somehow manages to win every time, giving all his earnings to some charity and living the boho way though life. Or at least that was the vibe he gave off. Harry stopped in his actions and put the cards down.

"Hey, Andy, sit down with us," proposed Harry and Mac started handing out the cards again, laying down Andrew's own pair. "We were about to play a game."

"Game?" the newcomer looked at Haymitch scornfully. "Who's that?"

"Hayden," replied Mac, "Alan invited him."

Andrew chuckled. "Really? Then you probably know where he is."

"I don't," said Haymitch simply. "It was an old invitation. I thought I'd find him here."

Andrew nodded slowly, probably not fully convinced but also not really interested anymore at the same time. He carefully walked to the table and slumped down next to Haymitch, who had to hold his breath for a second before breathing through his mouth. He didn't always take a shower and didn't bother to comb his hair sometimes, but compared to this guy, he was still a star in the personal hygiene field. He smelled like a cheap collogne, weed and maybe urine, but that could have been anything. Andrew opened the bottle of whiskey Harry offered him, took a gulp and then brought a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, putting one between his yellowed teeth and lit it up, blowing the smoke in Haymitch's face. All the cards have been dealt.

Joe started the game. "How much have you got?"

It took Haymitch a moment before understanding that the question was directed at him. He wasn't a big fan of card games in general. That was Chaff's field. His friend tried to explain the basics to him on a few occasions, but it didn't have the desired effect.

"You see," continued Mac when he saw Hamitch's hesitation, "small blind. How much?"

"Ten."

"Ten," repeated Joe with a mischevious grin and took the money Haymitch fished out of his pocket. "Alright. You?" he fixated his eyes on Andrew, trying to sit up straight on Haymitch's left side. Andrew snorted drunkenly, throwing a twenty dollar note on the table.

Haymitch put the money in as well, reaching for a bottle of gin provocatively standing on the table and used one of the free glasses to pour some of the alcohol in, watering it down with tonic. He put the bottles back in their place and drank the content of his glass in two gulps. The bitter taste of chinin chilled him and reminded him of something. He couldn't make out the whole memory, but somewhere in the back of his mind, he remembered palm leaves and coarse sand. He hadn't had gin and tonic in ages, but it was her favourite drink, so most of the time, the taste of the drink was second-handed on her lips.

Mac raised his left eyebrow. There was a small, thin scar above it and it was up to anyone to wonder where it came from. "Joe?"

"Twenty."

"Harry?"

Harry placed a fifty dollar banknote on the table without a word, lighting up a cigar.

"Call or raise, anyone?" asked Mac, shooting Haymitch a quick side-eye.

Haymitch partially zipped down his jacket and pulled out his wallet, a plain leather one, one with fake IDs, a vial of cyanide masked as algiphen, and, especially for this occasion, way more money than he usually had on him. He handed forty dollars over to Mac. "Call."

Harry gave him a nasty look. Mac put three cards on the table. "Second round."

There was no clock in the garage as well as pretty much no air, and the annoying white light and covered windows gave Haymitch the illusion of what it must be like in a casino, having no idea what time it is and what's going out outside of here and now. He'd never been to a casino, at least not for long and not to play. "Check," he said, reaching for the bottle to make himself another drink, but something in Mac's look told him no. Instead, he placed his fingers on his right thigh, feeling the blade looming under his faded jeans.

The room was hot. Haymitch felt first drops of sweat forming on his upper lips. Everyone else checked as well. Poker wasn't as fun as Chaff always claimed. It was just waiting and giving up your money.

"Turn."

The fourth card was a heart three.

"Check."

Andrew and Joe checked as well. Harry put more money in. Fifty dollars. That guy was too confident for his own good. Haymitch's own cards weren't much.

"River." Mac kept looking at Haymitch and it was slowly making him uncomfortable.

The fifth card was a diamond eight.

Haymitch decided to risk it. "Twenty."

"Check," said Joe as Mac took Haymitch's money.

"Fifty," grumbled Andrew.

Everybody glared at Harry as he raised the bet. One hundred dollars - he was just trying to make them want to give up.

"Didn't you have enough?" snapped Andrew, his drunken state giving off his accent.

"Shut up," replied Harry raspily, not at all bothered. Andrew, on the other hand, did seem bothered. He drank liquor straight out of the bottle and muttered something about greedy assholes to himself, and rolled up the sleeves of his expensive jacket. His forearms were covered in tattoos that were a mix of everything, ranging from dates that could mean anything to random letterings. Haymitch could swear he saw the word 'Hellman's'. And then there was the small white rose tattooed between the jungle of strange shapes on the inner side of his veiny left wrist that gave him away.

Haymitch shifted in his seat, watching Mac wink at him as he tapped on the rim of his empty glass, his shallow dark eyes finally getting some tone to them. "Showdown."

Haymitch was faster than Andrew as his elbow made contact with the man's neck. Andrew fell off the chair, Joe getting up so quick his own chair flew a solid meter behind him, yelling some curse Haymitch couldn't hear because Harry was already pushing him down. He reached for his knife, pulling it out of his pants in a trained motion and pushing it past Harry's ribs where it stuck, making contact with his heart. Andrew was coughing on the floor and Joe was trying to drag him back to his feet, but Mac's gun ended his attempt to help before it began. Haymitch threw Harry on the floor, kneeling next to Andrew. He leant in so close he could smell Andrew's cigarette breath in his face.

"Be fucking still," growled Haymitch. Someone was knocking on the door - pounding, more like. He chose to ignore it, Mac kneeling next to him, holding Andrew down. Haymitch pushed his forearm against Andrew's neck. "Andrei Yashkin?"

"Da," gasped Andrew, his eyes reddening.

"Good. Chaff, are-"

Mac knocked Andrew off with the barell of his gun, grabbing him and throwing him over his shoulder. "I've never been better."

Haymitch ran to the door, shot off the locker and kicked the door open, stepping back at the sight that came along in front of him. Nestor kneeled there with a bleeding forehead, a tall young woman with short brown hair holding him down by his handcuffed arms. "Jo, what-"

"I just got him, he was eavesdropping," she cut him off. "He tried to get in when he heard the noise. Should we take him?"

"No," he replied. Chaff with Yashkin on his back slid past Haymitch, leaving him standing in the doorframe.

"We can't just let him walk away. Coin is gonna send us to go fuck ourselves with this, we already lost time and now-"

Haymitch shook his head. "Jo, leave him be. He doesn't know what-"

"We're taking him," said Chaff resolutely.

Johanna took action immediately, putting a black bag, God knows where she pulled it from that quickly, over Nestor's head, dragging him with her by his arm. Haymitch and Chaff followed through a small gap between one of the garages and the wall of the neighbour building. The strange four ran into the street lamp-lit night, passing a church whose bell just announced midnight and a closed grocery shop in which's backyard was parked an old white van.

"Sorry," muttered Haymitch as he closed the back door, Nestor quietly but obviously sobbing in the cargo space next to Yashkin's limp body.

Johanna rolled her eyes. "He's a big boy," she said coldly, starting the unwilling engine aggresively, "he will be fine."

"He won't," replied Haymitch absent-mindedly, fighting the urge look at his phone. Johanna shook her head.

 _ii._

The house was completely silent when Haymitch pushed the front door open, careful to not make a sound. The hallway was dark, he supposed Effie was already asleep, perhaps out of spite, she was probably pissed and she had the right to be, but at the thought of sitting through a lecture, getting scolded like a little child, he was glad he could just have a drink in quiet without listening to her listing all the things he's done wrong in her eyes this time. There would be plenty of time for that in the morning.

Their neighbourhood in the southern part of Richmond was a quiet, boring place. All the houses here looked the same, built in a classical style out of pale bricks, with tree-shaded backyards and a gravel driveway. It was a nice part of the city, the newest, but empty sometimes. They only had two close neighbours, the rest of the people lived carelessly scattered all around the area and they didn't know most of them. Haymitch chose this place - if it was up to Effie who grew up in downtown Denver, they'd have an apartment in the city centre, a modern, airless, sterile one, with expensive designer furniture, expensive designer paintings and preferably expensive designer bathroom rugs as well. It took a lot of compromise to create what they could both call home.

He walked into the kitchen, knowing the path by heart as his eyes still haven't accustumed to the dimness, and headed to the bar, reaching to pick up a bottle of whiskey he had there for all cases, when he heard footsteps and the light suddenly got switched on.

"Shit," he cried out as he turned around so quickly he stumbled, gripping the edge of the bar for balance, eyes searching for the source of it all even though he already knew it was her. She stood there in her short silky black robe, arms folded on her chest, an unreadable expression on her face. Haymitch let out a short sigh, opened the bottle and took a gulp from it, not even bothering to get himself a glass. "You scared the hell out of me."

Effie eyed him quickly, her facial muscles tense with the aggravation she was failing to hide. "You're late."

His eyes shot to the clock above the door frame. It was almost two. "I know, sorry," he half-sat on the stool. "Go to bed, I'll come soon."

She walked closer to him, wrapping her arms around his neck loosely, wrinkling her nose as she took in the scent of his clothes. "You smell like a bar's floor, Haymitch. Where were you?"

"At a bar, obviously," he replied and slid an arm around her waist. "You should lock the door at night when I'm not here. I tell you that all the time."

"Don't come home this late then," Effie pouted and pressed a soft kiss to his stubble cheek. "So?"

Haymitch shrugged, taking another swig from the bottle, ignoring her peevish frown. "Kind of a shitstorm came, so Chaff took me out. I called you that I'd come later."

"I waited for you with dinner," she said and leant against him. "I thought later meant an hour or two."

"Stop doing this," he grunted. There they were again, her playing the _hurt by your carelessness_ card, and act that was slowly getting old. "Go upstairs, Effie, I'll join you in a minute. I just want to have a drink."

"Have a drink, of course. Weren't you at a bar?" she rolled her eyes, stepping away from him in annoyance. "How did you get here, anyway? Did you drive drunk? I didn't even hear the car and I don't want to know who you really were with. And you do know that this isn't _occasional drinking,_ don't you?"

He sighed, slamming the bottle on the marble surface of the island counter. "I was with Chaff, I just told you, for god's sake. Kinda hoped you'd trust me more, since I don't remember giving you a reason not to. So now that you know, we're going to talk about my drinking? Find something new to bugger me with, sweetheart."

"I trust you, I don't want to talk about your drinking, and I don't want to bugger you," she said patiently, placing one hand on her hip, the other over his on his knee. "I don't want to argue. But if you're going to get wasted, don't come over."

He knew Effie hated sleeping next to him when he was drunk, but Haymitch was suspecting her of just using it as an excuse to kick him into the guest bedroom when she wasn't in the mood for being with him at all, and that happened quite often. More often than he'd admit to Chaff, more often than he'd admit to himself. But he hasn't been exactly craving her company lately, either, and so he started spending more and more time in his study or in the living room, voluntarily. It wasn't going to solve anything, but it was preventing them from only going deeper into what Chaff called 'the seventh year syndrome'.

 _"The seventh year is the breaking point, Mitch,"_ he claimed one day over a glass of Scotch. It was the day Effie left for London without telling him anything before, just leaving him a brief message on his answer machine, and Haymitch started having his first real doubts. _"Either you're gonna make it, or you're gonna end it. And you know what possibility I'm leanin' towards."_

 _"Yeah, thanks for your opinion,"_ muttered Haymitch in response, thinking about his worcaholic of a wife, suddenly having a problem placing her next to the carefree college girl he married after a few months of an affair and started a life with without a single idea about real relationships. So many people only predicted them to last for a year, maybe two, then the passion would be gone, they'd realize they're completely different people, that they don't have real feelings for each other, nor do they have a reason to stay together anymore. They were wrong, partially. Both of them sobered up soon, but they somehow managed to stay together for seven years that weren't always sunlit, but that weren't always bad, either, and she eventually became the only certainity in his otherwise rather miserable life.

"I could just move into the study," he proposed wryly, sipping from the bottle, the burning sensation spreading down his throat to his stomach giving him the false sense of comfort. A pleasant warmth rushed through him as the whiskey left a bittersweet aftertaste on his tongue and made his eyelids pleasurably heavy, exactly what he felt he needed at that moment. "And you could do us both a favour in return and stop acting like I'm your pet. I had a fucked up day, stop making it worse."

"Oh, my apologies, then," Effie hissed. "I forgot you're the only one who had a hard day here. Or the only one who's tired. But mostly I'm just tired of you now."

"Ditto, Princess."

"Is this blood?"

"What?"

She tugged on the sleeve of his grey shirt. It was stained by small crimson drops, mockingly shining against the silver cotton. He stared at them, aware of her scanning every single move of his facial muscles. When he met her eyes, he shrugged. "I must have scratched myslef."

"But I don't see anything. Besides, it looks more like the blood was gushing out. No scratch," she retorted, pushing the sleeve up to look at his wrist. He winced and whisked out of her grip.

"I don't know, Eff. Maybe it's not even mine. Maybe it's Chaff's."

She growled quietly and he looked away. He hated how good she was at reading him. "Why _on Earth_ would it be Chaff's blood, Haymitch? What happened?"

"He... he broke his glass," he said unconvincingly. "He then tried to clean it up, I helped him and-"

"Darling..." she sighed, cupping his cheek tenderly. He didn't want to, but he responded anyway, leaning into her small, cold palm, inhaling the scent of her lotion and feeling the well-known pressure of her golden wedding ring against his cheekbone. Their eyes met again for a second before he closed them and let himself enjoy this moment despite the tension that was slowly building in the room. Eventually he learned that all the liquor in the world would never do, holding her, having her near, that was the only thing that could calm both his mind and his heart after an action, as well as send jolts of guilt through all of him. Lying was easy, putting them through dealing with the reality was... harder than lying, for sure. And he hated being this cowardly, but he'd rather lead her on than explain the past seven years and burst her bubble in which they were still happy and he represented safety and hope to her. He'd probably been representing something else for quite some time, but it was still better than let her see someone he himself resented so deeply, he burried it under years' worth layers of lies.

Her voice brought him back to reality. "Haymitch, please. I mean it."

"What?"

Effie closed her eyes in despair, a small wrinkle appearing between her furrowed brows. "Are you even listening to me? Are you _ever_ listening to me?"

"Sorry," he muttered and wrapped his fingers around her wrist to keep her hand where it was when he felt her moving it away. He didn't want to break the contact with her now. "Sorry. What were you saying?"

"I was talking about the marriage counselor. Maybe we really should try it. I know-" she slightly raised her voice when she saw him open his mouth to protest, "I _know_ that we already talked about it, and so far, each time I brought it up, you just walked away. I don't want to fight anymore. I don't want us to end up like one of those bitter old couples who just argue all the time and resent each other and are just unhappy and feel like it's too late to do anything about it. It's _not_ too late for us, Haymitch. Please, give this a chance. I think it's time."

Haymitch stared at her, his blood beginning to boil again. He trooped her hand away from his face, fully aware of the emotions that must have been written all over it. _Marriage counselor._ Those words truly have been spoken out loud in this house a few times before, and they have always resulted in a fight indeed. He wasn't sure whose idea it was, but he suspected it was either one of her annoying friends or her even more annoying mother who planted that idea in her head. Chaff probably talked to her, too. He never liked Effie, but he loved Haymitch, and he tolerated his wife for the sake of their friendship. And for the sake of it, he also wanted their relationship to be fine. He wanted Haymitch to be happy, and, strangely enough, he'd only ever seen him truly happy when he was with her.

But Haymitch didn't want to go to a marriage counselour. He couldn't help it - it felt like a last resort, _we're-about-to-get-a-divorce thing_ , and he simply refused to believe that their relationship was in such a horrible state that they'd need to seek advice from a professional. And besides, it wasn't anybody's bussiness what their relationship was like. They just had a weak phase, suffered from the _seventh year syndrome_ , fine, he'd admit that. It wasn't a big crisis. They didn't fight more than usual. According to her, it wasn't even the fights that bothered her. She always complained how they didn't do what they used to do, how all the excitement was gone. He'd admit that too. His drinking wasn't helping, either, though she apparently thought that was more of an outcome than a cause- "Ignorance is bliss, right?". But those things could be fixed, and they could fix it by themselves. He wasn't the only one to blame, after all; as far as he was concerned, she wasn't a saint, either.

"No," he said simply, reaching for the bottle she quickly hid behind her back, narrowing her eyes at him.

"Why do you keep doing this?" Effie shook her head, pushing him back on the stool when he leant in to take the alcohol from her. "There's nothing wrong with getting help, you know. And I just... I need to know that you don't want to give up on us. I need to know that you still see something worth fighting for here."

"I do," he replied, his voice coming off much sharper than he intended to, and he knew that the fragile peace he tried to make with her was over. "Damn, can't you just leave me alone for _one_ fucking evening? Or what are you suggesting? Are you not happy here? Because if that's so, then sorry, but start with yourself, sweetheart. I'm fucking tired of this. Don't do this whole emotional blackmail shit here and try to look at it realistically. If you expected that it's still gonna be fucking honeymoon seven years later, maybe _I_ 'm not the problem here."

"Don't talk to me like this," retorted Effie coldly, smashing the bottle back on the counter. "God, _whatever_ , Haymitch. Enjoy your drink, I'm going to leave you alone, _as you wish_. Liquor yourself to death if you please." With another frustrated sigh, she turned her back on him, quickly heading to the hallway. "Goodnight."

He didn't respond, just listened to her fading footstepts and the familiar thud of the bedroom door, followed by the click of the lock. Apparently he was spending the night on the sofa or in one of the empty beds whether he got smashed or not, so he wrapped his fingers around his bottle, got off the stool and switched off the lights on his way upstairs, the dark house tense with their previous exchange. He soothed himself that she wouldn't stay angry for long- that was his last thought as he collapsed into the cold, dusty sheets in the room furthest from the master bedroom, across the hallway from her and any responsibility. He sprawled on the bed and wondered if she stayed on her side of their bed (she had the left one, the one closer to the window, which she complained about all the time, because it meant always having to get up in the middle of the night to either close it or open it when the temperature stopped being comfortable) or chose the middle, and if she missed his warmth as much as he did, but fell asleep before finishing the thought, his fingers loosening their grip on the bottle.

The last thing he heard was the smashing of glass against wood and maybe something like a resigned snort from another room, but that was probably just his sleepy mind.


	2. Chapter 2

_**'Effie and Haymitch's marriage doesn't really differ from any other seven years long marriage. They got together young and stayed together through both worse and better, and now they're slowly drifting apart. And like all married people, they have their secrets, and it turns out they might not know each other as well as they thought - at all. | Hayffie Mr. & Mrs. Smith AU'**_

 **Disclaimer:** All characters except for the original ones belong to Suzanne Collins. Unfortunately.

* * *

 **Chapter II.**

 _i._

It wasn't his blood that she found on the shirt. His group was B. The blood on his sleeve was O.

Now she watched him sweat in his dark grey suit, the black tie loose around his neck. He was massaging his temple, eyes closed and brows burrowed, and a jolt of mischeviousness shot through her. She got what she wanted in the end, despite all his nagging and begging and childish attempts to make her cancel it. This was going to be a lesson, and an inevitable one. They should have opted for this a long time ago, and maybe then she wouldn't have had to wonder what the _hell_ happened on Friday, and what was someone else's blood doing on his shirt. The story about Chaff's glass breaking wasn't absolutely uneblievable - that guy was the most ridiculously careless and clumsy person when drunk - but there were clearly borders of what she would buy.

"What time is it?" he asked roughly, his voice soaked with aggravation.

"Ten after five," she replied calmly, browsing her fashion magazine without interest. He sighed heavily, placing his hand on her thigh.

"Eff-"

"We're here," she said categorically and looked up again. Haymitch was wriggling on the waiting room's padded seat next to her, nervous or annoyed or both. Dr. Aurelius was late, much to Effie's dismay. When she spoke to his secretary on the phone, she learned that he's very busy. What were the statistics? About three and a half divorces for every one thousand people in the US. She fought the urge to snort. "And we're going to finish what we started, whether you like it or not."

Haymitch rolled his eyes. "Whether I like it or not, sounds like one of our problems, perhaps."

"You can tell him," proposed Effie mockingly.

"I will," he promised and they went back to their patiently cultivated stubborn silence, broken by the entrance of a small-sized man in his early sixties wearing a white pants and shirt combo, his glasses hanging from his neck on a black string. He approached them with an absent smile on his wrinkled face, outstretching his hand to greet them.

"Dr. Aurelius," he said, quickly shaking first Effie's hand, then Haymitch's. He seemed strangely energetic for someone his age, but also kind of distracted, like someone who's daydreaming all the time and then suddenly forced to really look around. He spoke fast and didn't give either of them a chance to say anything, leading them to his office. "You must be Mr. and Mrs. Abernathy. Pleasure to meet you, really. Come in, make yourself at home."

The office was neat and tidy, everything was toned into ivory and cream, calming without the depressing hospital-like white that would probably give way too many people the feeling that there was really something wrong with them. This way, it was just like a nice talk with a family friend that would give them advice and joke about his own mess of a life, only if he charged $150 per hang out. Aurelius waved at the leather armchairs with many cusions of the same color, gesturing them to sit down, and sat behind his huge wooden desk. "So, Mr. Abernathy, you are... I mean, your proffesion..."

"I teach History at University of Richmond. I'm actually going to be lecturing at Columbia University tomorrow."

"Interesting." Dr. Aurelius nodded to himself, joining his hands in front of him and resting his chin on them. "I wanted to be a teacher too. I planned on studying physics, ended up becoming a therapist instead. I guess I deemed people more interesting than warm holes." He turned to Effie politely. "And what is your occupation, if I may ask?"

"I work at a management company," she replied, struggling to find a comfortable position between the many little pillows. "Most of my clients are models or generally people from the fashion industry."

"So you are both often away, right?"

Effie cleared her throat. "Not as much as we used to. But yes, it's hectic."

"I see." Dr. Aurelius leant back against his chair, then jumped from his seat quickly, startling them both. "Where are my manners, right? What would you like, coffee, tea, water, juice-"

"Just water for me, thank you," Effie cut him off mercifully.

Haymitch shrugged. "Me too."

Aurelius grabbed two glasses from a small cabinet and filled them unevenly with tap water, then returned to the table and handed the drinks to the sheepish couple, spilling some of it on Effie's handbag which he didn't notice and she gracefully refrained from commenting on.

"So," the therapist finally sat back and relaxed, a newfound seriousness settling upon his features. "You are here for a reason. Today, we're just going to look at your marriage as a whole. Marriages in general are hard work more than anything. And naturally, hard work can be very tiring. Especially if it's been going on for a longer period of time. You probably put a lot of time and energy into your relationship over the course of the years you've been together, and seeing seemingly no results must be exhausting, even more so if all you can focus on is the bad. How long have you been married?"

"Seven years," said Effie softly, her fingers brushing past Haymitch's knuckles when he laid his hand on her chair's armrest. "It's going to be eight years next March."

"Seven years." Dr. Aurelius sighed dreamily. "Have you ever heard about the seven-year itch? The rate of marriages ending in divorce around this milestone is depressing. People start to feel disgruntled about not only their relationships, but also their jobs, their homes, their hobbies. They feel unfilfilled and as if they're going nowhere with their lives. It's like a midlife crisis, only regarding stuff that they've been stuck with for seven years. If I understand it well, you are childless, right?" Small nods followed. "You never talked about starting a family?"

The married pair exchanged brief looks. "Actually, not really," said Effie hesitantly. "You see, we are both very busy people, and... neither of us is focused on having children. We're not exactly parental people, if you see my point. It was never... we didn't get married with raising a family on our minds."

"You agree with that?" asked Dr. Aurelius, turning his head slightly in Haymitch's direction.

"Yes." Haymitch felt Effie's grip tightening on his hand, considering it a sign that his answer wasn't enough. "We're both away a lot and as my wife said, we're not particularly parental material. And we prefer our own peace, you know?"

"There hasn't been much of that lately," remarked Effie.

"How come?"

She let out a breath. "We haven't been spending much time together lately, and when we did, we just argued. It feels like... I don't know, like something's missing."

"Have you talked about these feelings to your husband?"

"Of course!" Effie puffed. "But he never listens. And when he does, he turns it against me."

"Someone has to do that," opposed Haymitch, "since your level of self-awareness is pretty low."

"Can it," she hissed, giving Aurelius an apologetic smile. "I'm sorry. But you see, this is what happens every time. I have been trying to get my husband here for months. I brought it up last year, several times, with no results, of course."

The doctor raised his greying eyebrows. "So what made him change his mind?"

"Her being a bitch," muttered Haymitch, trying to take a sip of water and spilling it on his pants instead when she hit his arm.

"You two are apparently both very stubborn people," observed the older man, hardly supressing the amusement in his voice. "You just have to be careful so this determination to always have the last word doesn't become self-righteousness. Relationships between people of all sorts are all about finding compromises, and if you can't find them, you make them. If two very strong personalities clash, it can either be forever, or end very badly, especially if your priorities and opinions differ so drastically. And I sense that you two are strong personalities indeed."

Effie listened to Dr. Aurelius with mixed feelings. There was no doubt that he was right about the clash of personalities. She'd always believed that opposites attract, which was one of the reasons she decided to give their relationship a go without much thinking. What one lacked, the other compensated. She had her head in the clouds, he had his feet firmly on the ground. She believed, he knew. She talked, he listened. She loved, and he loved, too, if not even harder, but she chose to show it and he was the withdrawn one. They were a solid team. But as easily as their significant differencies helped them bring out the best in each other, it easily made them bring out the worst as well.

It was a marriage born out of passion. They got married during a small ceremony in Las Vegas with no one but Chaff and Portia, Effie's collegue and best friend, as their witnesses. After that followed a two weeks long honeymoon in Malibu, full of sex and lazy morning cuddles and surprising each other with breakfast and going for long beach walks. She agreed to move to Richmond with him, took what remained of his old house that never really felt like home, and turned it into a place he liked coming back to. They were so crazy about each other that they couldn't keep their hands off each other, that they didn't care how aggravating the other one could be. Making breakfast was all about him having his arm wrapped around her waist from behind with a mug of coffee in his free hand and kissing her shoulder while she was cooking scrambled eggs. There were movie nights that would end with them watching each other instead of the TV screen. They bickered and insulted each other all the time, but rarely really argued. The real fights came later, when they slowly but surely began to understand that the initial flutter had gone, and - and it took a couple years of walking with their heads in the clouds - they realized that like all the other marriages born out of passion, theirs slowly but surely began to feel more like a prison of their own foolishness than a safe haven that they'd want to spend the rest of their lives in.

And still, she didn't want to give up, because Effie wasn't one to surrender without a fight.

"So what are we supposed to do?" she said.

"You need to learn how to talk to each other," said the therapist, "and how to really listen. The art of communication is essential in every aspect of your relationship. You'll be practicing it in my office, and then at home, until you feel like you are finally open and ready to let the other one in again."

They nodded shortly.

"Now," prepared Dr. Aurelius to change the topic, "how is your intimate life?"

Effie almost rolled her eyes. She expected this question, and had to remind herself that asking things like this was simply this man's job, but it was still uncomfortable, blush spilling all over her powdered cheeks. "Uhm, intimate life, you mean-"

"How is your sex?"

Haymitch snorted. She inhaled deeply, masking it as a sudden need to cough. "That's great," she managed to say. " _Sex_ , that's great, actually-"

"How often do you engage in sexual activity?" asked Aurelius simply.

"Uhm-"

"Better question, what was the last time you engaged in a sexual activity?"

There was an awkward silence as the couple processed the doctor's directness. Their eyes met for a second and then flinched away. Effie's cheeks were burning; she could tell Haymitch was embarassed, too, though he did a significantly better job at hiding it than she did.

"I'd say- like..." Haymitch tapped his fingers on the leather armrest, "maybe... a month ago?"

"A month?"

There was no way how to detect whether their answer was a good answer or not, because Dr. Aurelius had this annoying trait of keeping a completely straight face, quietly making his own conclusions.

"Yeah, give or take..."

"Three weeks," said Effie promptly, "it's been three weeks, maybe not even that long-"

Dr. Aurelius raised his hands in a calming gesture. "Mrs. Abernathy, you are not here to impress me and I'm not here to judge you. We are here to work on the problems you've come across lately and to help you with finding their cause. To do just that, you're going to have to be honest, as honest as possible. I get that you feel uncomfortable, maybe even embarrassed, but I assure you, there is no need for that. Every relationship is special and unique and different, and we are going to treat yours as such. Relax."

"Two months," admitted Effie defeatistly.

Aurelius shrugged and gifted them a wide smile. "See? That's something else."

"I don't really see what makes it something else. We were just busy, so there wasn't mood, there's nothing else to it, really," replied Haymitch, now openly regretting ever giving into Effie's wishes.

"So you'd say that after seven years, your sex life is still alive and well, right?"

"Pretty much alive and well, thank you."

Dr. Aurelius nodded to himself. He did that quite a lot. "I've got an idea."

Effie winced. "Yes?"

"I was thinking that maybe... maybe we should go back to the start."

"Back to the start?" she repeated uncertainly.

"Yes." Aurelius lent back. "How about you tell me the story of how you met?"

Effie and Haymitch looked at each other, a twinkle in their eyes and a small, almost sentimental smirk on their lips. When she was getting ready for the Fourth of July party eight years ago, she never thought it would lead to a marriage counseling session, but she melted at the memory, and she knew that he did, too. "Okay."

 _ii._

 _"I'm going back to the hotel."_

 _"_ Damnit _, Haymitch," sighed Chaff, finishing his tequila. "We just started."_

 _Haymitch rolled his eyes. He hated those parties. Everyone was already either smashed under the table or puking their last week's diet in the toilets. Why Chaff insisted on coming, he didn't understand. Their ideas of 'fun' have apparently shifted in different directions lately._

 _"We've been here for three hours," he growled, but he doubted his friend could hear him over the loud rock music, drunken shouts and girly giggles._

 _He looked around. Danny's, a once-upon-a-time probably glamorous bar in downtown L.A., had one of those juicy nights. Independence Day was apparently a much bigger deal here than in Seam, his small hometown in Richmond suburbs where people had common barbecues and kids ran around with sparklers. A group of girls was flirting with a bartender, some guys were playing pool, and everybody seemed to be having the time of their lives, but he simply couldn't follow._

 _"Have some more drinks," prompted Chaff, already waving at the bartender. "We'll have another round of tequilla."_

 _"No, we won't," growled Haymitch, fully aware that everybody was staring at them. His friend could be pretty loud after getting some. "You're gonna turn me into an alcoholic. And you've had enough."_

 _In the corner of his eye, he noticed her. She lent against the counter a few stools away from him and brought a pack of_ Gold Flakes _from her purse. He turned his head slightly to take a look at her without being too obvious as she lit her cigarette up and ordered something. She was short even in her heels, but she had a great body that he couldn't help but check out and that her tight white lacy dress was bringing a lot of attention to. Her wavy blonde hair seemed so soft, he really wanted to touch it, and he could smell her sweet perfume despite the cigarette smoke all around. She looked at him briefly, her electric blue eyes judging him quickly before she decided he wasn't worth her attention and turned it to her drink instead._

 _Chaff saw her, too. He poked his friend and pointed in her direction with his glass. "Go to her."_

 _"No," Haymitch snorted, but looked back at her, almost unvoluntarily. There was something mesmerizing about her smooth movements and the way she carried herself. "She's stuck up."_

 _"What makes you think so?"_

 _"Look at her." He sighed, grabbing Chaff by his upper arm. "C'mon. We're going back."_

 _Chaff whisked out of his grip. "We ain't going anywhere."_

 _"Fine, you stay here and chat up local Barbies while giving yourself a fucking alcohol poisioning. I'll be at the hotel."_

 _"Wait," Chaff tapped his arm, "go to her. I'm serious."_

 _Haymitch rolled his eyes. "Why don't you go to her_ yourself _, if you find her so interesting?"_

 _He shrugged. "Not really my type. Also, Kayla..."_

 _"I see," Haymitch sneered. "You really should get your shit together."_

 _Chaff scowled at him and then grinned brightly. "Wanna bet?"_

 _"What?"_

 _"Let's have a bet."_

 _"About what?" Haymitch sighed. "Chaff, really-"_

 _"We'll play pool," he offered. "Just one round. I win, you're gonna come to her and kiss her."_

 _Haymitch chuckled. "I can't just come up to someone and kiss them. I don't think she's the type to laugh it off."_

 _"Rules are rules, buddy," Chaff laughed. "Now,_ your _conditions."_

 _"If_ I _win,_ you _go to her and kiss her."_

 _"I can deal with that, really."_

 _"Fine, deal."_

 _Fifteen minutes later, Haymitch made a mental note not to_ never _make a bet with Chaff_ ever _again._

 _"So," Chaff was grinning, leaning against the pool table, "gimme a sec, gotta get me some popcorn."_

 _Haymitch narrowed his eyes at him. "Go_ fuck _yourself, Chaff."_

 _"I fully intend on doing so," he replied in amusement, jerking his head towards the woman. "Now, go to her."_

 _"No." Haymitch looked back at her. She was still there, sipping still the same drink, smoking another cigarette, talking to some dark-haired guy who was standing next to her, leaning in and whispering something to her. "She's there with someone, Chaff. This is_ fucking r _idiculous."_

 _Chaff shrugged. "Well,_ rules are rules _. Good luck, buddy."_

 _Haymitch closed his eyes hopelessly, then took a swing from the tequilla bottle on the pool table, collected all of his courage and made his way to her, preparing himself for the scene this would surely cause, hoping the man who was there wasn't her boyfriend or brother or anyone else with the motive to smash his head with a beer bottle for it._

 _He fucking hated his best friend sometimes._

 _He touched her shoulder and spun her around on her turning stool, and she didn't have the time to do anything when he crushed his lips against hers and his fingers dug into her upper arm. She made a surprised noise, her palms immediately pushing against his chest to set him back, and he didn't even have time to properly taste the gin on her velvety soft lips, intoxicated by her warm, sweet scent, before he stoppped and let go of her. He pulled back, noticing that the guy had already gone, and finally got to take a proper look on her face, shock plastered all over it. Her hand shot up and he grabbed her wrist before she managed to slap him. Inside, he was thanking heavens that apparently, nobody noticed what was going on._

 _She_ was _hot. More than just that. Breathtaking, actually, really beautiful, with soft features and marbel skin, it almost made him want to touch it to know whether it was just as cold as the stone, but he doubted it, considering the blush spilling over her neck. However, her mandel-shaped eyes stared at him defiantly with a promise of inferno and however it may have been somewhat exciting, there was nothing pretty about it._

 _"Now that wasn't very polite," she accused sharply and got off the stool._

 _"A_ thank you _would be in place," he retorted._

 _"I'm supposed to_ thank you _for kissing me without my permision?"_

 _"I was just helping you out," he shrugged in excuse, kind of amused, kind of annoyed._

 _The woman shook her head, her voice on the high-pitched side, but not soft as he'd expected, but shrill, and_ demanding _. "I didn't_ need _your help. He was nice, he was- well,_ not you, _you_ brute _."_

 _"He was an ass who just left instead of punching me out," he deadpanned._

 _They just stood there, eyes locked, her slender creamy fingers with the longest pink painted nails he'd ever seen anyone wear on her hips, his own hands slowly curling into fists as he battled both severe aggravation and rather urgent arousal. It's been long, he realized all of a sudden, longer than he thought. Maybe Chaff was right... as to Chaff, he was apparently having the time of his life, his abrupt laughter finally catching the annoyed pair's attention._

 _"What's so funny about it?" she snapped at him._

 _"_ God _, doll," he shook his head and had another shot, still laughing, "I'm_ begging _you, get him laid tonight."_

 _"_ What did you _-"_

 _Haymitch hit his shoulder harshly. "For_ fuck's _sake, Chaff, we're leaving," he decided and headed for the door. "Sorry, sweetheart, lost a bet. I had to do it. No knots tied."_

 _She gripped his biceps roughly, holding him back with more strenght than he'd suspect the petite woman of. "Where do you think you're going?"_

 _"Nurse my friend's hangover, probably," Haymitch said, "you can join, if you wish."_

 _"No, thank you," she wrinkled her nose, shaking her head at him again. "Don't call me sweetheart."_

 _"Fine, Princess," he smirked slowly, "how do they call you in the- wherever you came from?"_

 _She rolled her eyes and it was obvious that the initial anger was slowly dying down. "Effie. Effie Trinket."_

 _"What kind of a fucking name that is?" he snorted, but when he said it out loud, he was surprised to realize that it sounded quite nice, even in his coarse voice that was nothing like her girly tone. It rolled easily on his tongue and it suited her. Shiny, pretty, somewhat posh. "_ Effie. _"_

 _Effie Trinket raised her eyebrows in anticipation. "And_ you _are..."_

 _"Haymitch," he smiled and that was all he offered her._

 _"Well, pleasure to meet you," she said carefully, eyes falling on the other man. "And your friend..."_

 _"Chaff," Haymitch shrugged and continued in his journey to the exit. "Well,_ pleasure to meet you _, too, sweetheart, but I've got to get him somewhere where he can vomit in private."_

 _Chaff waved his hand. "I'm fine."_

 _"Sure," Haymitch mocked, "you can't even walk straight."_

 _"No, really," he said and stabilized himself by grabbing the counter, "call me a cab, buddy."_

 _"We're_ both _leaving," insisted Haymitch, shooting Effie an uncertain look._

 _She raised her eyebrows and sneered. "Well, I'd say you didn't quite get the protocol right," she mocked. "You owe me a drink, I'm afraid."_

 _"I don't-"_

 _"Stay," said Chaff, patting his back quickly, "I'll go back to the hotel. I should call Karla-"_

 _"_ Kayla _-"_

 _"Yeah, Kayla, yeah."_

 _Effie sighed. "I'll call him a cab," she offered, moving away from them and pulling her phone out of her purse._

 _Haymitch turned to Chaff with a glare, shaking his head at his friend. "What_ the fuck _, Chaff-"_

 _"You made quite an impression," Chaff chuckled. "Look, buddy, she's just acting up. She likes you. Buy her a drink and enjoy yourselves, okay?"_

 _"You wanted me to lose_ really _badly, right?" he muttered._

 _"Yeah, actually. She's your type. Have fun, Haymitch. You need it. Look, I know I haven't been exactly the_ best _best friend ever lately, but I happen to love you and-"_

 _Haymitch rolled his eyes but smiled nevertheless. "Don't drink anymore, Chaff."_

 _He smiled, too. "Yeah, well... have fun."_

 _"The cab will be here in five minutes," Effie appeared next to Haymitch and interrupted their conversation._

 _"Thanks, doll," Chaff wrapped his arm around her and pulled her in briefly, and she squealed when he pressed a kiss to her cheek, Haymitch laughing but pulling him away from her at the same time. Chaff patted Haymitch's arm and headed to the door, his legs rather tangled. They watched until it fell closed behind him, and exchanged awkward looks._

 _"This is fucked up," he stated, rubbing the back of his neck. "Sorry. We had a bet. I lost. Shouldn't have done that-"_

 _"Are you going to buy me the drink already?" she taunted, folding her arms on her chest. She was smiling softly and he was wondering if he was seeing right, because so far, he thought that all her mimics were just irritated glares and angry frowns. "Your friend is... well,_ friendly. _Does he even have money for the cab on him?"_

 _"Yeah, he is. And who knows," Haymitch smiled fondly and then he started laughing. She didn't join him, but didn't scold him, either, and let him guide her back to the counter, his hand at the small of her back. They lent against it and waved at the bartender. "What do you want, sweetheart?"_

 _"I already told you not to call me sweetheart," she retorted. "I have a name and am not exactly keen on patronizing pet names. And I'd love a gin and tonic."_

 _He gave the bartender the order and turned back to her. She didn't seem as uncomfortable as he was afraid she would- in fact, she was smiling at him. "He dragged you here?" she asked._

 _"Basically." The bartender gave them their drinks and left them to themselves. He raised his glass of whiskey and she raised her cocktail, and their eyes met, storm clouds and summer sky. "So, to... America, I guess."_

 _"Do you really care about today?" Effie laughed lightly. "My parents always used to make great deal of this. We had a Fourth Of July party every year. I prefer the New Year's eve."_

 _He watched her, a smile stretching his lips. She had a snobbish accent, but when she spoke, something really made him want to listen. He wasn't sure if he really cared about what she was talking about, he just liked the rythmic sound of it. She was like a ball of energy, it was just radiating off of her. Generally, she was a sweet view._

 _"I don't," he shrugged. "But, whatever. It's Fourth Of July."_

 _It went well. It was one of those remarkable moments when the time just seemed to be flying- they had a few more drinks, but they talked, too. Mostly, she talked. Effie Trinket was the kind of person who didn't really care if you're listening to her, she just_ enjoyed _talking. She told him about her friend who made her come here, then left with some random guy, about her parents, about a movie she was last week, about her school - apparently, she was studying management at University of Colorado. And he listened to all of that, realizing that she was the most irritating, annoying,_ fucking _aggravating person he'd ever come across with, but at the same time, there was something irresistible about her, and it didn't just have to do with her mere looks, it was the energy surrounding her. She was bubbly, she was_ bright _. He didn't have much of_ bright _in his life._

 _At eleven, she stopped in the middle of her story about her friend's wedding dress shopping, and her eyes, now kind of glassy thanks to the alcohol, got all lit up. "Fireworks!" she exclaimed, got off her stool and dragged him outside, not really caring about paying, and he followed, her small hand fitting into his much bigger, calloused one easily. There were already tens and tens of people out in the street, looking in the direction of the pier. The fireworks went off and sparks flew everywhere, and especially in his stomach when he tore his eyes from the red and gold toned midnight sky and set them on her. She was laughing, drunk, careless, wrapped her arm around his and he lent in, silently asking for permission this time, one that she happily granted him and their lips met, moving against each other's as if it was the most natural thing in the world, which it soon would be. They didn't know that at that time. They were just two strangers who were kissing under a sky full of stars and wildely colorful sparks, in the middle of a crowd of people who didn't pay any attention to them._

 _She ended up in his bed that night._

 _He ended up in hers the following one._

 _A few weeks later, they bought one to share._

 _iii._

"That didn't go that bad," she remarked as she fastened her seatbelt.

"Yeah," he humored, starting the engine of his old Audi, "but all that talk about... you know..."

Effie laughed, resting her head against the black leather of the passenger seat. "Well, it _was_ a bit over the top, I admit. But Dr. Aurelius was nice. I can imagine him actually helping us. He seemed interested."

"Yeah."

The notification sound of Effie's BlackBerry caught their attention. She fished it out of her purse, opening the text message.

Effie, I need you at a meeting at four. Urgently. - Jane

She sighed, putting the phone back. Haymitch gave her a quick look, then locked his eyes on the road again. "What's that?"

"Darling, could you please drop me off at work?" she asked, placing her hand on his that was rested on the gear shift. "We have an urgent meeting. I'm sorry."

One little known fact was that Jane wasn't real. _Jane_ was Effie's fuse in case Haymitch - or anyone else, for that matter - decided to go through her personal phone. She, in fact, had many fuses. It may have seem paranoid, but after all those years, Effie figured it was always better to be safe than sorry.

"It's fine," he replied evasively. "Actually, I have some work, too. I need to prepare the materials for the second year. I should drop it off at Beetee's today."

Effie nodded slowly, suddenly fed up with no real reason to. The childish part of her felt like she lost again. That was one of the things Dr. Aurelius warned them about - that they might start competing, power playing. You call off visiting my parents so I call off the date night. She hated the feeling of being even when it wasn't in her favor. "Okay."

"I'm sorry, Effie," he said. "I want... to make it work."

"So we don't have to go there?"

"No," Haymitch snarled, "so that we're _fine_."

She nodded again, pointing at a corner turn. "You can stop here, it's just a few blocks away."

"I can take you there, Effie."

"No, really, it's fine," she waved her hand and unfastened her seatbelt. "I want to walk."

He sighed and stopped as close to the sidewalk as possible. She quickly gathered her handbag, put on her light pink coat and lent in, pressing a soft peck to his cheek. "Thank you."

"Be careful," he said simply, despite the fact that it was still pretty light even in the middle of October and that the streets were lively and crowded.

"Don't worry," Effie smiled and got out of the car, shutting the door closed. She waved at him quickly, and he watched her disappear behind the corner, adjusting her white silky scarf, and his mind wandered back to their previous reminiscing for a second, before someone's angry horn ripped him out of his trance.

* * *

 _Hey guys! So, first of all, thank you, thank you, THANK YOU for all the nice and motivating things you said about the previous chapter. It really made my day. Also, sorry for delivering this WAY later than I planned, but stuff happened, school is already hell. But here we are! I haven't decided on an update day yet, but I'll probably go with Sunday. I'm going to update bi-weekly, since I'm not sure if I can keep up with weekly updates, because, besides other things, I started writing another fic. I'm currently finishing my first draft and I'll see where it goes, but this story is my main focus. So, that's it for today, I guess! Hope you enjoyed it. Have a nice day! x_


	3. Chapter 3

_'Effie and Haymitch's marriage doesn't really differ from any other seven years long marriage. They got together young and stayed together through both worse and better, and now they're slowly drifting apart. And like all married people, they have their secrets, and it turns out they might not know each other as well as they thought - at all. | Hayffie Mr. & Mrs. Smith AU'_

Disclaimer: All characters except for the original ones belong to Suzanne Collins. Unfortunately.

* * *

Chapter III.

 _i._

She eyed the empty underground garage carefully, tapping at the steering wheel pensively and occasionally glancing at the digital clock on the dashboard. The big red numbers were telling her as much as that she was already late.

 _Where was he?_

"For how long are we going to be stuck here?" she hissed.

"Sorry, Effie," Portia's muted voice spoke in the earpiece in her ear, "the camera system is a _mess_. Cinna said he saw someone coming, but it was a woman."

"I see her."

It was a tall woman with long strawberry blonde hair who was coming from one of the office building's doors, unlocked a big SUV, rummaged its trunk for a few seconds and then pulled some papers out of a briefcase, shut the trunk and headed back, high heels clicking. Aside from that woman who now disappeared behind the sliding doors and Effie in a black mercedes parked in the furthermost part of the parking lot, there was no soul in sight.

Effie leant back against the the leather seat and took some papers out of the compartment. The first paper was a profile of a man named Jason Macpherson. A British businessman, was in Atlanta for a training, he was supposed to leave tomorrow. Forty-six, married, a fifteen year old son. She sighed.

The rest of the papers contained a thorough summary of all of his activity in America, his contacts, and brief profiles of all the people he knew here. Portia's team did an amazing job, she had to admit that. Proper planning was a key, but few people were as efficent as her best friend and few people were as demanding as herself. In return, she was by far the best in her field.

She tucked the papers neatly in a clipboard and put them back. According to the car's clock, it was half-past seven.

It seemed like forever until Portia spoke again. "We've got him. He's going to the garage, but he's not alone."

"Who is it?" Effie frowned to herself, reaching under her seat and pulling out the small gun, and quickly loaded it.

"I don't know, honestly. I don't remember having him in our record... take him down, too."

"Okay."

She rolled the window down and waited, but nobody was coming.

"Portia, are you sure he was headed here?"

"Absolutely." Portia paused and mumbled something that obviously wasn't directed at Effie. "Yeah, he was going to the garages," she said finally and that was all she could offer her. "I can go take a look but somebody has to stay here and watch. Wait- I think the guy that is with him is his bodyguard."

"So what? I'll just fire it through his brain and get out of here already."

"Effie-"

"Good plan," a rough voice said right next to her, "except you won't finish it, honey."

Her first instinct - to shoot whoever the hell was the person standing next to the car and talking to her through the rolled-down window - turned out to fail her when the man stroke her cheek so hard she dropped the gun and a cry escaped her lips, and before she had time to put herself back together and pick it up - or at least pull out the for-all-cases long, thin knife hidden in her boot - the door opened and she was being dragged out of the car.

She heard the familiar click of the gun's lock and in a well-trained motion knocked it out of the stranger's hand, turning to face him in the process. The man was around fifty, just a bit taller than her, but obviously much stronger, muscles shaping under his black tux. He moved forward to hit her again, but Effie blocked his arm and kicked him in the stomach, Portia's voice screaming something in her ear.

"Effie, what's going on-"

" _Bodyguard!_ " she barked in response and ducked.

Portia was talking so fast it made her head spin and she couldn't concentrate. She was yelling some directions at her, but Effie, usually not one to dismiss orders, kind of had hands full - finally, she tore the earpiece out and threw it back in the car, blocking another blow. Her ultimate goal was to get to at least one of the guns, but eventually decided breaking his neck and getting out of there as fast as she could would do. Her opponent apparently had the same plan, and quite _obviously_ didn't expect her to be an equal adversary, given he looked taken aback by her blocking all of his attacks and fighting back with the skills one wouldn't expect her to posess. That was what Effie hated dearly, but what also almost always played in her favor in the end. People - especially men, though she had met some women who did that, too - had tendencies to underestimate her, mostly because she was physically petite and acted so delicate, but she was a good enough actress to lead them on in this belief and then snap their necks when they least expected it, preferably without getting much dirt behind her nails.

This was a messy job, though, because she broke his nose, which provocated a curse and also a rather heavy bleeding. It got on her white blouse and she sighed in aggravation. She hadn't brought a spare one with her, which she mentally scolded herself for. She should put "buying the same piece of clothing twice" in her preparation process for every mission. But she seriously thought she'd be done _fast_ here today.

None of her plans seemed to be turning out well lately.

Neither was their struggle, because the sound of a car driving through distracted her long enough for the man to take advantage of it and punch her in her stomach which made her knees week. She dropped down on all fours with a quiet cry, breathing through the pain, noticing that the man's gun was half way under the car. Effie saw her chance and took it, jumping toward it and rolling under the car. However, before she her fingers reached it, the man kicked it away from her and picked it up. She cursed under her breath, trapped beneath the car. One thing was clear, she had to get out of there. Another thing that she realized was that Jason Macpherson was the person in the car that drove past them just moments ago, which meant that he was long gone and neither Portia nor Cinna knew what was going on.

The man dropped on his knees to look under the car and pointed the gun at her. Effie had one undeniable quality - her self-preservation instincts worked _perfectly_. She rolled out from beneath the car and the man misfired, which led him to yell some insult at her. She was hiding behind the car, but he was on his way to her. The first thing that came to her mind was opening the car door and jumping back in, but she figured he'd shoot her before she could even attempt to do it.

However, rolling under the car once more, then opening the door on the other side and grabbing her gun was something she could try to do.

She confused him profoundly with this move. When she got back to her feet, they were pointing their guns at each other. He fired first and missed just because she jumped out of the way, falling on the floor. In a second, he was on top of her, hands on her wrists, but she kicked him in the groin and rolled them over, so she was half-kneeling on the floor, one knee pressed to his crotch, and smacked him over his face with the barrel of her gun.

For a second, his fingers wrapped around her throat as he pulled her back down and climbed on her again. She managed to press the barrel against his ribcage and pulled the triger just when his grip on her neck tightened.

Effie breathed out heavily and pushed the lifeless body off her, getting back to her feet and running to the car. She grabbed the earpiece and placed it back.

"Portia? Portia, can you hear me-"

" _Effie!_ "

"I've got it," she reassured quickly, looking at the corpse lying just a few feet away from her. "I'm fine, but Macpherson's gone."

"I know," grunted Portia unhappily. "According to the tracker in his car, he's heading for the airport, but if he knew someone was watching him, maybe he's just trying to mess with us. Get in the car and go after him, I'll clean up the mess and Cinna's going to check the rest of Macpherson's possible destinations."

Effie nodded to herself quickly and got in the car, starting the engine before she even fastened her seatbelt. "Thank you. Write down the time and place and report it immediately."

"Sure. Be careful."

She drove out of the garage, taking up speed when she got on the road. Downtown Atlanta was busy in the evenings and she was threading through the cars and people running on the crosswalks in the dim Autumn weather, the sun barely providing any light anymore. It would be dark in a matter of minutes, which was a good thing.

Effie had to stop when the car in front of her got a red light and she took the moment to get in her coat and hastily cover her blood-stained blouse with her scarf, since the big red pool all over her chest probably didn't give the best impression. The smell of blood was making her feel uneasy so she focused on pulling a tablet out of her handbag, placing it in the satnav holder and tapping a code into it. An animated map of the city appeared on the screen with two dots, one blue, one red. The blue dot represented her, the red dot represented Jason Macpherson's bugged car - that was going to the airport but not to the regional one, but to a private one for small personal planes.

"Can you catch up?" asked Portia.

"I'm not sure..."

Just when she said it, the light turned orange and then green. Effie depressed the pedal and overtook three cars at once, annoyed with herself. She always argued with Haymitch over their styles of driving. She was extremely careful - usually - and sticked to all the regulations, which made him laugh at her and call her out on driving like a girl. He drove fast, usually ignored traffic lights and often drove after drinking. He did drive a lot more carefully when she was with him, but she scolded him for being so careless nevertheless. He would definitely mock her until the end of time if he saw her now.

Effie didn't have time to reflect on today's session with Dr. Aurelius yet, but she thought it went quite well. Well, it _was not bad_. She could actually see some sense in it and she hoped Haymitch did, too. He _did_ give in, even if it went against everything he believed about relationships - "It's nobody's business, and how can some guy who doesn't even know us help us, anyway?" - just because it made her feel better. Maybe it was because she arranged the appointment without telling him so and then dragged him there without him knowing where exactly they were going, but still, he could have just left. Which he wouldn't have done, because it would mean her yelling herself hoarse at him later. But she _knew_ that behind all his selfish reasons, he didn't want to see her upset or sad anymore. _Maybe_ he was just as lost as her and she appreciated that he took a step back and accepted the help that was being offered to them.

He could be the most irritating person and he could drive her crazy, but all in all, everything he did, he was doing it to make her happy.

She digressed to a highway and didn't bother to care about what number was written on the tachometer. According to her tablet, she was still a lot behind him, but she was coming closer and closer with each passing second. The blue dot was mere centimeters from the red one on her tablet, which meant that in reality, she couldn't be more than a few yards behind Macpherson.

"Was it a dark blue Rolls Royce? With a Georgia license plate?"

"That's it."

Her mercedes was now in Macpherson's tow. Effie slowed down a bit but didn't dare to relax. She hated not knowing who was aiming at her back while she was concentrating on a thousand different things. The blue Rolls Royce abruptly branched off at a turnoff leading into a small driveway surrounded by two fields, not far away from where the airport was located. Effie followed it, and Macpherson must have realized that someone was after him, because he hesitated for several seconds, slowing down, and then set off with much more speed.

She unloaded her gun and rolled the window down, paralleled her car with his and reached out, opened the door on the passenger's side before he could lock it and pointed the gun at his head. She pulled the trigger and the Rolls Royce descended into the scarp as Jason Macpherson's lifeless body fell on the steering wheel. Effie turned her car violently and headed back for the headway.

"I'm finished," she declared, "where's Cinna?"

"Thank god," sighed Portia in relief, "he can be there in two minutes. Get out of there as fast as you can. Has anyone seen you?"

"No, but tell Cinna to be careful."

"Good. I'm reporting now."

When Effie reintegrated into the faster lane and rolled her window up, it was already completely dark.

 _ii._

Alma Coin was a strange woman. She was unreadable and that was just one of the many things that kept making people around her uncomfortable. Her perfectly sleek silver hair, her calculating dark eyes, distantly judging and making her own conclusions she would later voice in her reserved, cool tone that gave away the impression she knew exactly what she wanted and wouldn't stop before anything to get it - that was on the list, too. It wasn't just in her appearance, she was simply a repugnant person in Haymitch's eyes.

When she appeared in the door, Boggs following her, the chatting in the meeting room stopped immediately. She eyed her employees in a haughty manner. Katniss Everdeen, the newest member, a moody girl with long dark hair and the best aim he'd ever seen who was just just moments ago arguing with Peeta Mellark, who appeared here just a few weeks after Katniss and got teamed up with her which was a decision Coin had obviously regretted deeply, because their results were as miserable as this boy's skills with everything that wasn't a pencil; Johanna Mason, whose axe was as precisely targeted as every insult that left her lips; Finnick Odair who had his questionable methods of getting information and Johanna's cunning partner, always there to apply cold water to a burn caused by her big mouth; Beetee Latier, a fucking genious whose ideas often went without a response because nobody understood what he was even talking about; and then there was Chaff who gifted Haymitch with an amused smirk and his friend rolled his eyes at him. Joking on Alma Coin's accord was one of their favorite pastimes, because it was also the only thing bringing some air into any situation concerning her. She took herself way too seriously - another reason he disliked her wholeheartedly.

She gracefully walked to her desk in front of the long round table that the people were sitting around, followed by their gaze, and stood behind it for a bit before sitting down, Boggs taking his place by her right side.

"Good evening," Coin greeted her small audience and sat down. She gave them a small window to pay her full attention, and when she was sure everyone only had ears and eyes for her, started. "So first of all, I'd love to thank Haymitch, Chaff and Johanna for the results of their Friday mission. They got us Andrei Yashkin, finally, so hopefully, we can call this case closed. Great work, as always."

Haymitch nodded simply, uncomfortable with the sudden attention and everybody's eyes on him, and Chaff smiled, while Johanna looked smug, but didn't o ffer any other reaction. It wasn't surprising news, anyway. Who else would do the dirty work for Coin than the best in their field?

"Now, for our next task."

The lights in the room went dim and the big screen behind her lit up, and the logo of PANEM, a silver bird in front of a dark blue background, appeared, followed by an interactive profile of some man including his portrait from all angles, basic information and a register of all his connections.

"Bernat Herrera," Coin said, "a Mexican businessman and the inheritor and owner of the _Herrera_ hotel complex, thirty-nine years old, unmarried, no children. He lives in Tampa and is going to open a new hotel building in Richmond tomorrow."

She waited a bit until it was settled and tilted her head slightly in Haymitch's direction. "Chaff, Haymitch - I want you two there. I hope it's not a problem."

He shrugged. Chaff nodded slowly.

"Good. I'm going to give you his detailed profile to take home with you. Now, to the unfortunate news. My insider at CAPITOL told me this morning that they are going to have one of their agents there tomorrow, too." She frowned as she spoke, but her voice was calm. She was always calm. "So I dearly advise you to be extremely careful. Beetee, I want you to go, too. You and Chaff are going to monitor the the place from the outside. We don't know the agents' names, but we are going to locate them. It's in your best interest to get rid of them first."

"You mean kill them," Chaff clarified.

"Actually, taking them to us as well is even better," Coin smiled coldly.

"Do they know we'll be there?" Haymitch asked, studying the face on the screen in front of him.

"No. It should be safe."

He left that without a reply as she started further explaining the case. The rivalry between PANEM and CAPITOL sometimes resembled some old tale of two age-long enemies. There was, in fact, no _real_ difference between those two companies, but Coin, ready to tell to everyone willing to listen to her, always claimed that while Capitolans were _assassins_ , PANEM's agents were simply a private secret service to hire by people who either needed to temporarily get rid of someone or needed to get their money or whatever else back when the help of police failed. Generally, PANEM was after the bad guys, CAPITOL was after everyone as long as it got them money. Or at least that's how she put it. Most of PANEM's employees were former FBI or CIA agents, for they had the skills and the work ethics, and officially, they almost never actually _killed_ their targets. The truth was, they _did_ kill a lot and murder was still murder no matter the motives.

Haymitch started out as a cop. He eventually got into FBI where he met Chaff, Beetee and a couple of others. At that time, Coin was the head of the Criminal Investigation Division at FBI, but wasn't really satisfied with her job. She left and for several years, nobody heard from her, until one day, she individually asked her old subordinates whether they would like to try something new. Haymitch stood at a crossroad at that time. It was around the time he was having first real problems caused by drinking, and everybody knew sooner or later, he would get fired anyway. He took a few weeks to make up his mind and, of course, it was Chaff who talked him into transfering to Coin's newly founded organization.

Him, Chaff, Beetee, Finnick, Johanna, and newly Peeta and Katniss - who were still in training and were here to get supervision from the established members - eventually all became part of what she called the _Star Squad_ , the best team, often sent into the most risky missions. Aside from them, there was a huge team of technics, forensic experts or scientists to back them up, all from different places, various secret services, some were cops, some were marines, some were just really smart people who found a good use there. The missions were well-planned, because Coin liked everything well-planned, and succesful in 99% of cases. Coin _did_ do a great job with the company. She built something huge and fully functional out of nothing just because she had a vision and a leash. Nobody could deny that her intentions were good, but in Haymitch's opinion, her methods have been resembling CAPITOL's _way_ too much for his taste lately.

As to CAPITOL, nobody really knew much about it, except from that it was _huge_ , and that it was there long before PANEM. They were, in Coin's words, just cold-blooded killers, paid to eliminate whoever you asked them to remove. Their clients were generally wealthy people, politicians, celebrities, businessmen. You could also count their fails on the fingers of one hand. They were invincible, perfectly trained, perfectly prepared, capable of anything. The head of the company used to be someone named Snow, but they kept everything perfectly secret. They had their main base somewhere in Colorado, but apparently, they had a few headquarters in the South and on the East Coast as well, though, despite Coin's best wishes and efforts, she never managed to locate it. Fortunately, CAPITOL never found PANEM's headquarters, either.

Sometimes, PANEM's and CAPITOL's missions interfered. It was very rare, but those two companies being the biggest in the field in America, it was inevitable. It was annoying and led to several casualities, which prompted Coin to a move she often praised herself for - getting an _insider_ at CAPITOL. Nobody knew who it was or how she was so sure the information she got from them was solid, but she seemed fully confident in it and that probably _did_ mean something, because Alma Coin was unreadable, her looks made you uncomfortable and she took herself too seriously, and was also very suspicious. Haymitch may have disliked her and a lot of her decisions, but he really wanted to believe she wouldn't put anyone in danger.

"Everything is clear?" Coin asked, briefly eyeing the faces of the present people.

The response was an echo of approving grunts from all corners of the room. The lights went on again and someone turned the projector off. Coin placed three files on her desk and got up while collecting her things into her breifcase.

"The profiles for Haymitch, Chaff and Beetee are here. As usual, don't lose them or manipulate them in public places. You know how it works, I'm sure."

She nodded at Boggs and headed towards the door. He followed her, held the door open for her and then walked out, following her like a dog follows its owner. It wasn't really that far from the truth, Boggs was her right hand, and the only person _even further_ up Coin's ass was probably Gale Hawthorne. Haymitch didn't have the time or nerves to poke in it, but from what he understood from the conversations bewteen him, Katniss and Peeta, he quickly made his picture about what this whole situation was about. Apparently, Gale was Katniss' best friend and the reason the girl decided to join PANEM. Since the day Peeta came, he was fascinated by Katniss and couldn't be happier when he got paired up with her. Haymitch didn't really care, but at the same time, he didn't think that three teenagers in some fucked up love triangle was the best thing to have around during dangerous and often emotionally tense situations.

Katniss was better off on her own, anyway. She wasn't built for team work. She was really smart, she could shoot well - she used to do archery - and was stealthy and people generally didn't pay much attention to her. However, she was way too easy to upset or distract and didn't like taking orders, which resulted in many problems between her and Coin. Peeta was a good person to be on a team with, but didn't really get much work done on his own. Haymitch thought he was simply too naive for this job. Katniss saw better through things. No wonder, though, because she had a severly depressed mother and a younger sister so she was used to being the one in charge of herself. And no wonder Coin saw potential in her when Gale, her childhood friend who had originally wanted to be in the army, brought her along on his first day.

"Here," Chaff waved the file in front of his eyes and handed it to him, slumping back to the chair next to Haymitch. "You're okay? You look pretty horrible today."

"Thanks," he sneered and pulled out a flask out of his jacket. He first offered Chaff who simply shook his head and then took a gulp out of it.

"I'll have some," declared Johanna, walked over to them, took the flask out of his hand and brought it to her lips. With a pleased sigh, she sat on the desk, Finnick taking place next to her.

"So, how did it go?" she teased.

"How did _what_ go?"

"Your therapy," Johanna chuckled. "Heard there was some trouble in paradise."

Haymitch narrowed his eyes at Chaff. "I told you-"

"C'mon, it's not a big deal," Chaff laughed, "we all mean well."

"Sure," he grunted, reaching for his flask.

" _So_?" Johanna kept taunting and passed the flask over to Finnick. One of her both best and worst traits was her mischievousness. It was fun while you were listening to her making jokes about someone else, but the second her relentless banter turned at you, it took a lot of your best will to let it pass without taking her down.

Finnick smirked, took a sip and ran his hand through his golden hair. "I hope you know that if anything, you can always come to me for advice. Or you can bring your lady, I'm sure she wouldn't complain, either. I've got a reputation after all..."

Haymitch whisked the flask out of Finnick's fingers and gifted them all with an annoyed look that prompted all three to laugh, and headed towards the door, grabbing his file in the process. It was the hand on his shoulder that stopped him. He looked around in aggravation, surprised to meet his eyes with Peeta. The boy looked nervous, his pale blonde brows slightly burrowed and an unsure smile on his thin lips.

"Sorry," said Peeta and shot an apologetic look in the direction of Katniss, who sat alone behind the table with arms folded over her chest and didn't bother to even look at him, "but I have a... well, _we_ have a question."

"What's that?"

"We had a talk with Madame Coin earlier. She told us to ask you if you could find some free time to help us from time to time, you know, just a few lessons, a learning curve."

Haymitch raised his eyebrows. "A learning curve? You've been here for what, two months? That must be an old request, boy."

"We've gone through the basic training, but Madame Coin thinks we could use some guidiance from someone who's been in this forever. She told me to ask you but-"

"But it's not a question, it's an order."

Peeta nodded hesitantly.

"Fine, I get it." Haymitch sighed and his wandered to Katniss who was watching the two of them with the look he couldn't describe as anything else but _betrayed_. "She doesn't seem very happy."

"She thinks it's useless," explained Peeta. "Or maybe she just doesn't like asking for help, I don't know. But we _need_ help. The training wasn't enough. We finished our missions with some good results but, well, Madame Coin didn't say so explicitly, but we think that if we don't get better, she might either separate us or put us into another team."

Haymitch supressed a smile because he had this gut feeling that Peeta didn't care about their results as much as he cared about being separated from her. "And are you sure getting another partner or working on your own wouldn't do you two any good? I think she'd prefer her own space."

The younger man turned sheepish. "Maybe. I'd say she thinks I'm dragging her down."

"And are you?"

"She'd think that about every partner, and we can't be on our own for the first year, anyway," Peeta shrugged. "So even if she wanted to work alone, Madame Coin wouldn't allow it."

"And I'm supposed to do what exactly?"

"I don't know. Anything you might find useful, really. Tell us about some of your actions, show us some tricks. Give us some advice."

Haymitch chuckled and patted Peeta's arm and opened the door for himself. "Alright. I've got a number one advice, you'll need it. _Stay alive_."

Then he walked out, leaving the boy alone in the doorframe with Katniss' angry gaze glued to Peeta's back.

* * *

Hello there, everyone! Thank you for such a nice feedback. It makes me very happy and really motivated. I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and definitely feel free to let me know what you think. Next chapter, something interesting is going to happen... x


	4. Chapter 4

_'Effie and Haymitch's marriage doesn't really differ from any other seven years long marriage. They got together young and stayed together through both worse and better, and now they're slowly drifting apart. And like all married people, they have their secrets, and it turns out they might not know each other as well as they thought - at all. | Hayffie Mr. & Mrs. Smith AU'_

Disclaimer: All characters except for the original ones belong to Suzanne Collins. Unfortunately.

* * *

Chapter IV.

 _i._

There weren't many skyscrapers in Richmond - there were high-rise buildings, but it was no New York. The scraps of memories Haymitch had from his childhood in a small town with a good view of the state's capital's downtown, the city had only become so modern-looking in the past few years. There were parts of Richmond he had, for whatever reasons, never been to, and the new shopping area was one of them, the very same area where the new hotel from Herrera's complex was being opened, right in front of the skyscraper which's stairs he was just taking with Chaff and Beetee, who was in a way worse physical condition than his two companions and was panting hard while clutching his technical equipments to his chest, following him closely.

They got to the very top of the building where you couldn't get by elevator, to the door that led to the rooftop. Haymitch pulled out a knife and quickly forced the lock open, and held the door for Beetee and Chaff to go first, then shut it behind himself as he ran out into the cold autumn night air.

"Fucking stairs," moaned Chaff and fell on his knees ponderously. Beetee, totally out of breath, was still struggling to catch it as he took place in front of him and started putting together the pieces of his mysterious device, his own invention.

"Is it gonna work?" asked Haymitch and adjusted the beanie on his head. He checked the time and then crouched next to Chaff, nodding towards the weird combination of tablet screens, wires and aerials on the ground in front of them.

Beetee pushed the glasses up on his nose and wiped his forehead. "It should," he answered breathlessly. "It worked in ten cases."

"Ten?"

"Out of twenty." He smiled, but his face was concentrated. "So, it's fifty-fifty. Now move, you're blocking the waves."

Haymitch rolled his eyes but did move a bit, lied down on his stomach and brought out his field-glasses. He scanned the scene down in front of him. He had never heard of this Bernath Herrera, but there were enough people down in the street to make it seem like he was an interesting personality. The hotel looked quite nice from the outside - it wasn't the tallest building he had ever seen, but it gave off a majestic vibe, made out of white bricks, with exotic flowers framing the windows and golden details, including the huge _Herrera_ and the five stars above the main entrance. There were people in tuxes and in long evening gowns, and despite his life-long distaste towards so obviously rich, obviously posh people, he had to admit that it looked pretty.

However, the owner was apparently quite a pain in the ass for some people. As for him, Haymitch checked the time again. The main event starts at seven, so he had about twenty minutes to arrive. Maybe they should have given themselves a bigger window in case the original plan fails, but he trusted Beetee. Johanna nicknamed him _Volts_ and often claimed he was nuts, but it always shut her up when he came up with some last resort idea that would save everyone's asses. There was some half-cooked stuff like this thing he finally managed to compose - it was supposed to catch the waves of CAPITOL's agents' chips they all had on them that served as trackers. That way, they would be able to locate them. Or something like that, beacause as usual, nobody except him knew exactly what he was doing.

"I've got it!"

"Yeah?" Haymitch got up and walked to the other two men with genuine curiosity.

"Yes, it's working, look-" Beetee held up his laptop that was showing a tangle of colorful lines, like on the devices in hospital that monitor your heartbeat. Haymitch wasn't any wiser from looking at it, but he proudly patted his friend's arm, anyway.

Chaff beamed at him, too. "Awesome! Now, where are those assholes?"

Beetee placed the laptop back on his lap, frowned and typed something. "I'm working on it. They're somewhere around here, wait... the coordinates..." he was typing frantically while scrolling on his tablet that was showing the 3D map of the city. Suddenly, he stopped and his face darkened. "Well, this is... unpleasant."

"What?" Haymitch looked at the tablet and his own high spirits fell. He shot a look towards the neighboring skyscraper, a department store named _Kendals_. The name made in big fluorescent letters was proudly shining from the rooftop. "No way."

"Are they fucking taping us?" Chaff loured. "How come they knew-"

"Maybe they didn't." Beetee shrugged. "Maybe this is just a big, messed up coincidence. We can be glad we didn't all meet up here."

Haymitch looked through his field-glasses again. They may have been inside the building, but he felt better checking the rooftop first - and could congratulate himself for it. His nightvision caught a movement - he was sure it was them. They were walking out of the coop on top of the building.

"I see them," he muttered, and the rustle by his side let him know Chaff was taking out weapons. "Where's Herrera?"

"At the airport," was Beetee's reply. "Quickly, just finish this."

"Fine." Haymitch went down on one knee and took the machine gun Chaff was handing him. He looked through the gunsight, also equipped with night vision. It took him a while to actually _see_ anything, though - the people were dressed in black and hidden behind one of the tall letters. You wouldn't see them from the ground and it was difficult to see them from the place Haymitch was. "How many?"

"There should be two."

He nodded to himself - that would agree. The people were had their own field-glasses on them and with hoods over their heads - but the glimpse of long blonde hair of one of them surprised him. Chaff saw it, too. "I think they're chicks."

Haymitch didn't like crossing his paths with women in this field. They were unpredictable - they were _deadly_ , and he hated having to get all rough with them, even though he knew they'd snap his neck and so much more otherwise, so he was quite immune to that by now. Back in his FBI days, a girl stabbed him in his stomach, then cut it open - he could see his intestines. It took him two months of bed rest and painful sobriety to get well. Women were _trouble_. He could vouch for that - he had one at home.

"Let's just make this quick," he decided and looked through the gunsight again, targetting the one with the blonde hair. He tried to zoom a little better, but he couldn't see her face - and that was probably for the better. There were few things worse than having to look into the face of someone whose life you were about to take away. It was something he had learned the hard way, a lesson he took from both nights of insomnia and of nights haunted by the visions of faces in their last moments of being human, living, breathing. _Murder was still murder_ , but it was easier to pull the trigger when the person in front of you didn't really seem like a person and more like some abstract pattern.

"I'll do the other one," said Chaff and dropped down next to him.

They targeted them carefully, Chaff slowly counting out loud from five to zero, and he was on three when the blonde woman in front of Haymitch's focus took off the glasses and her hood fell back a little, revealing her whole face and her wavy tresses, and then there was one when she moved so unfortunately he _did_ get to see her face properly, and he almost had a heart attack when she looked up, even from all this distance he recognized that face, he'd _always_ recognize it - he'd spent too many hours looking at it in the pale moonlight in their bedroom when she was asleep and he was too scared to close his eyes in case he missed something about her - and then there was zero, the finger on the trigger just didn't seem to be cooperating, and he heard a noise and saw the other woman fall to the ground. Suddenly, he wasn't looking at them anymore, he was jumping out of the way of a bullet that came from the other side, one that would have gone straight through Chaff's stomach had it not been for his bullet-proof vest.

"What the _fuck_?" yelled Chaff and covered his head with his arms when he fell down and rolled on his stomach. "Why didn't you shoot-"

Haymitch looked over his shoulder from the same position as Chaff on the ground. "We have to get out of here-"

"Yeah, you don't say!"

His eyes shot up to see how his friends were doing - Beetee was lying on his device to shield it with his own body and Chaff was unloading his gun.

"Don't!" he snarled at him.

Chaff narrowed his eyes. "What do you mean, _don't_?"

" _Just don't,_ " Haymitch got off the ground and, slowly gathering all his strength and common sense, helped Chaff back to his feet.

"What was that?" Chaff growled at his friend again.

"I don't know," he replied honestly, head spinning.

"They're calling it off," Beetee interrupted him, listening to someone talking in his earpiece. "The mission is cancelled. We missed him."

" _Shit_ ," Haymitch's riffle fell uselessly to the ground.

Beetee eyed the both of them, scowling at Haymitch. "What is going on?"

Haymitch shook his head dismissively. It was spinning and he just wanted a fucking drink. "I'll tell you later. Let's go back."

Chaff was frowning at him deeply when he walked past him towards the door leading back to the inside of the building. Beetee quickly got off the ground, gathered his stuff and gifted Haymitch with a vacant look before following Chaff's example.

 _ii._

Effie liked everything well-planned. All of her missions were always neatly lined up, with exact information and everything properly organized. And people around her knew it and never dared to protest or go against her design - because there were few things that could set her off as well as unpredicted changes of plans.

They had a good plan. They had a good place, too. The rooftop of _Kendals_ provided them with both a great view and somewhat a great hiding spot, particularly the coop where they put their equipments and didn't have to stand outside in the cold. Effie hated autumn, she hated dark and she hated surprises.

"He's coming." Portia was sitting opposite her, laptop on her lap, typing something. "We've got about two minutes. We'll only have one opportunity."

"It will be fine," said Effie and unlocked the tablet with the map of the town. Cinna, who was monitoring the situation from the headquarters, sent her the coordinates of the airport. She quickly saved them into her report and then assigned the tablet to show her the surroundings. The view of twelve small screens appeared, a camera system they had previously put on. Everything seemed to be working well. She smiled to herself and stretched contently. "I can't wait to take a hot bath."

Portia scowled to herself and pulled up her black turtleneck. "I can't wait to get someplace where it isn't _freezing_. We should have brought heating along."

Effie smiled again and got up. "I'll take a look outside."

She opened the door of the coop and walked out, then sat down with her back against the wall. The hotel looked beautiful - a place she'd surely love to stay at, if she wasn't about to kill its owner. There was a lot of light pollution but the sky was starry, it was nice, because the last few days have been depressingly dark and hazy. Maybe the weather would be better tomorrow...

Her eyes fell to her wedding ring. It was a two-tone gold with a thin stripe of diamonds. She loved it, it was the most beautiful piece of jewerly she's ever seen and she remembered how excited she was when he bought it at that small Las Vegas jeweller's. The ring on her middle finger was the engagement ring that used to belong to Haymitch's mother. He gave it to her when they got back from their honeymoon, and he was so insecure about it. She knew that he grew up in rather poor conditions, his father was a miner and died when Haymitch was really young, and his mother was a seamstress with several other part-time jobs. This ring wasn't anything like Effie's, but he still wanted her to have it, and she genuinely liked it. Just a plain silver band that she wore next to her own golden one everyday, like a metaphor for their worlds, and often looked at it when she felt like she didn't understand anything anymore.

Effie took both of the rings off and hid them in the small inside pocket of her black leather jacket.

Suddenly, Portia opened the door violently.

"I think I saw someone," she told Effie and dropped on her stomach with her field-glasses. Effie followed her example.

"What?"

"On the rooftop. Somebody is there. And they have _guns_. They're targeting us."

She turned on the nightvision mode and zoomed better in the direction where Portia was pointing - and a bad feeling chlenched her stomach. "Do you think it's _them_ again?" Her blood began to boil in her veins at them mere thought of that.

Portia shook her head unhappily. "It's possible."

" _Bastards_ ," Effie hissed and got up. Portia did, too, and they went back into the coop, quickly gathering their guns, and then ran out again.

Effie took off her nightvision glasses, exposing her face for a split of a second, and before her and Portia managed to target them and figure out what was even going on, Portia fell to the ground with a painful hiss. Effie reacted automatically - she jumped down, unloaded her gun and pulled the trigger. She got one of them - probably the one who shot at Portia. Then, through the rifle's gunsight, she saw him, one of the two other men, he was lying on the ground and moved so unfortunately that when he looked over his shoulder, she saw his face, and it was just a glimpse but it was enough for her to nearly fell off the edge of the roof. She stopped the gunfire and grabbed her field-glasses again.

They were getting up and she could now only see their backs - they were leaving without even shooting at them again. _What was that?_ She was almost sure both her eyes and mind have completely betrayed her just seconds ago. Too shook to think staright, she remembered Portia.

She was already getting up, nearly unharmed thanks to the bullet-proof vest.

"Are you okay?" Effie asked and gripped her arm.

"Yes, I'm fine-" Portia let Effie help her to her feet and looked through her gunsight. They were already gone. "Where are they?"

Before Effie managed to answer, Portia's phone buzzed. She brought it out of her pocket and took the call. "Cinna?"

"Are you two okay?" Cinna's low voice wafted through the speakers.

"More or less," said Portia, "do you know what the _hell_ was that?"

"No, but I know this - they're calling off the mission."

"What?" Effie frowned. "Why?"

"You missed him."

Effie whispered a curse and Portia shook her head in disbelief. "Are you serious?"

"You have to get out of there, they're all after you now," said Cinna and ended the call.

Effie still stared at the phone blankly, feeling sick from the stomach and dizzy all of a sudden. Portia nudged her with her elbow. "Effie?"

"It's fine," she replied absent-mindedly, "we have to go."

 _iii._

The white van stopped abruptly and parked by the sidewalk. Chaff looked over his shoulder from behind the steering wheel at Beetee and Haymitch, who were sitting in front of each other in the back of the van, Beetee's eyes fully focused on his laptop.

"What the _hell_?" Chaff climbed over to join them and slouched down next to Beetee.

"The trackers are still working," remarked the scientist and showed them the map, the two red dots representing the CAPITOL agents. "We can see where they're going."

Haymitch moved over to them to take a look. Whatever he saw on that roof left him scared shitless. He knew that something was wrong - there were nightmares, tremors, depressive moods and bad habits in general, like skipping meals or forgetting showers. It was bad, but _hallucinations_? He had never had those before and honestly, this fucked him up like nothing else has. Whatever he saw, it was just his tortured mind playing tricks on him. And still, if anyone asked him at gunpoint, he'd stand behind it - it was positively and undoubtly Effie he saw back there.

He knew Chaff was watching him, so he just moved his head slightly in a _not now_ manner and focused on the screen.

"Looks like they're going to the City Circle," Beetee remarked.

"What would they be doing at City Circle?" Chaff raised his brow. "There are just offices."

The bad gut feeling Haymitch had, that strident stabbing in his stomach, had only gotten worse. City Circle... offices. They all realized it at the same time.

"Their headquarters," he said and Beetee nodded.

Chaff snorted. "After years and years of looking for them..."

"We don't know for sure," reminded him Beetee. The dots were still moving and they the three of them were just dumbly watching them.

"Should we go after them?"

"No, that's a bad idea," said Haymitch slowly, "we should go back. Coin's gonna gut someone, anyway."

"And that _someone_ is gonna be you," mocked Chaff. "Did you lose your mind? We could have-"

"Shut up, Chaff," Haymitch gritted through his teeth. "If you listened to me and didn't shoot, either-"

Beetee interrupted them. "They're parking."

Haymitch took a look at the screen, and that horrible feeling was now spreading from his stomach to his chest where his heart sunk, and from chest to his limbs that became numb and limp, and then further to his throat that clenched and to his head that was left completely blank. He heard their voices but he didn't know what they were saying, because he could only think about the adress that was written on the screen in front of him. City Circle 112, Richmond, Virginia. Building he knew very well, because he had dropped her off and picked her up there countless times over the course of the past seven years. It was nothing but an office building, part of it was rented to a software agency, part of it to the management company that she was working for. The air wasn't coming to him. _Capitol Management. CAPITOL. Roof. Effie._

That couldn't be real. This was the worst bad coincidence _ever_. Wrong place, wrong timing... stressed people see things they shouldn't be seeing.

And _still_ , if you asked him with a barell pressed to his temple - he'd tell you it was her.

That was when it started making sense, while making no sense at all.

 _iv._

"I can't believe it!" Effie stormed through the rotating door, trembling with rage. She was in that state when she was mad at everything in the world, and the most at herself. _How could she be so stupid?_ She was a professional. Never in her career had she made a mistake like this. That's not what they train you for at CAPITOL - there is no time for mistakes there. They train you for precision, for clean cuts and quiet solutions. They don't train you so you let a whole group of rivals who were shooting at you just seconds ago go without a fuss because your overwrought, silly brain makes you see things that aren't there. There was no place in hell she'd admit it out loud to anyone, though. She had no idea why something like this had to happen at the worst time possible.

Cinna looked over when her and Portia walked into the spacey meeting hall. CAPITOL's headquarters were located in the highest floor of one of the City Circle office buildings and it was a modern, airy place with the newest technical equipment, white-painted walls, fancy decors and huge windows always covered with white sunblinds, sunglight replaced by sharp white lights in the form of huge round neoteric-looking chandeliers. He was sitting on the dark purple sofa in the center of the room with a tablet and when he saw them coming, he stood up and greeted them, his handsome face tense with concern.

"Are you alright?"

Portia nodded and let him wrap his arms around her briefly. The bullet didn't even touch her - it was aimed straight at her heart, but she had a good bullet-proof vest. Cinna helped designing and developing those. "I'm fine," she reassured him and kissed his cheek.

"Effie?" Cinna looked at her with burrowed eyebrows.

"I'm _furious_ ," she replied and headed to one of the asymetrical desks, slumped down at the chair and logged into her account on the computer. "Could you please give me my rifle?"

Someone handed it to her wordlessly and she took it and connected it to the computer. Effie typed a password and the the two softwares allied and the recording from the gunsight started downloading. She did the same thing with another cable and her field-glasses. While it was loading, she got up and went to the minibar, brought out a bottle of Evian and took several proper gulps. That was it, she mused, she was dehydrated and tired. She pushed buttons on the coffee automat and went back to the desk. The recordings were almost loaded.

Portia and Cinna brought themselves chairs and stared at the screen when Effie sat down and started tapping at the desk with her long nails impatiently. The second video, the recording from the field-glasses, downloaded first and she opened it while her heart was racing and she was so annoyed as she didn't know how to calm it down. She was afraid of what she would see - in the end, she wouldn't see much.

"That's them?" asked Cinna.

"Yes," Portia nodded and pointed at one of them. "This one shot at us."

"I took him down," said Effie, "I should have aimed for his head."

The video was shaky and blurry and the nightvision mode wasn't helpful. It ended after a few seconds and Effie closed it. Meanwhle, the first one finally loaded. Her fingers were shaking when she opened it and Cinna noticed, placing his palm over her hand. "Are you sure you're fine?"

"Of course," she insisted, but it wasn't the most convincing thing that's ever left her mouth. She was aware of them exchanging shady looks, but left them to it and clicked at the _play_ button.

At first, the recording was absolutely useless - she couldn't make anything out of it. It was when she fell... then she shot at one of them. Into his stomach - yes, it was a good shot, but she should have gone for the head, that's always certain. That was when she was getting up... she was looking at the other two, they were all lying on the ground - one of them was lying on something that looked like an old television, for some reason shielding it instead of himself, but she wasn't shooting anymore, she was looking at the man between them... he was wearing all black, including a black beanie, but then he moved a bit and raised himself on his forearms, looked over his shoulder...

She inhaled sharply and Cinna and Portia, deep in their conversation about Portia's vest, glanced at her as she startled them. "What's that?"

It took Effie a few seconds to recover. She heard the automat's notification sound and the only thing that came to her mind was to ask them to go get her the coffee. It was Portia who got up, but Effie needed a moment alone. She had to look at it again. "Cinna, could you please go get me my flashdisc? Portia knows where it is."

Both Cinna and Portia must have been confused, but did what she asked of them without protests and when she didn't feel their presence in the room anymore, she replayed the video, running out of oxygen since she was holding her breath. She shot the one who fired at Portia - they all jumped to the ground - there were shaky movements as she adjusted her gunsight - the man in the beanie was lying on his stomach, then he looked over his shoulder-

Effie gasped again and replayed it once more, then, when it came to the sequence of him turning his head, she stopped it - it wasn't the most reliable image, they weren't using some IMAX cameras after all, but... she _finally_ breathed out and gripped the edge of the desk. She moved closer to the screen... so close her eyes were hurting because of the brightness... she touched the screen as she studied the picture...

That couldn't be right. She was simply refusing to believe it. Who she was looking at was _scarily_ resembling Haymitch - it was insane, but when she was looking at that video, she saw it quite clearly. She kept studying the video - it looked like him from the profile and also when he looked over his shoulder, that way, he was basically looking at the spot she was standing at... it even looked like him from the back, too, now that she almost convinced herself it was him.

She pulled back, got up and started breathing deeply. She was just tired and she was dealing with so much bullshit concerning Haymitch lately, it was probably just her mind warning her that she might need a bit of a break from everything. Yes, talking herself into that was easy when she thought she saw something she didn't see once, but now? Effie leant against the table and closed her eyes. When she felt like she was ready, she looked at the video again, once more stopping it in the moment when his face could be best seen...

"Oh my god," she whispered. "God..."

The world was spinning with her. Here, on the big screen right in front of her, she had an undeniable proof that she maybe wasn't crazy, but if that was truly the case, that could only mean one thing she wasn't able to understand yet.

"Effie?" Portia walked into the hall with the wireless landline phone's handset in her hand. "It's Haymitch. He says you aren't picking up - he just landed from New York. He'll be home at nine."

Effie hastily closed the video and turned around, forcing a smile on her lips. "Oh, that's great!" she disclaimed, trying to tame the trembling in her voice. "That's awesome, tell him... tell him I'll meet him there. And could you please bring me the flashdisc?"

"Okay." Her friend gave her a suspicious look and went back into her office. Effie collapsed onto the chair and gave herself a few minutes off. Just to catch her breath... and let herself process it.

Just twenty minutes ago, she had fired at her husband, who was supposed to be lecturing at University of Columbia but for some reason happened to be at the rooftop of a department store, while one of his friends was shooting at them. They were... following her? Did he know about all of this?

Then it hit her. PANEM.

Haymitch.

She closed her eyes.

How could it be? What kind of hellish coincidence would _this_ have to be? It was just her paranoid conception...

And maybe it was but... what else could be the explanation?

Effie took a deep breath and cleared her throat, forcing herself back into her professional mode.

First of all, she needed her coffee. Then she was going to insure the recordings, and then she had to call Sae.

 _v._

Haymitch was sitting in his car in the driveway with his wrists rested on the steering wheel, fighting the urge to empty the flask in the compartment in one gulp. She was home - she had already put her car in the garage and the lights in the hall and kitchen were on. He had been going through it over and over the whole way home. Whatever it was that was going on, for now, he decided he was going to stay calm - and sober.

A task easier said than done.

He wondered if she had seen him, too. It was possible - she fired at Chaff, and then she just let them leave.

Of course, it could have all been just one huge coincidence - a really bad coincidence. It was pretty possible that he just saw a woman who looked a _lot_ like his wife - that _was_ possible. That, however, didn't explain the tracker. The people, whoever they were, had their headquarters at City Circle, in the exact same building Effie's office was. He knew that for sure, he had never been up in her office, but he had been to the building a few times. You needed special cards to check in there and the security was pretty high, but he had always thought it was because of the software company that was residing there.

Maybe those people were from _there,_ but then again... _Capitol Management. CAPITOL._ It made sense, but it was also absolutely _insane_.

So for the past fifteen minutes, he was sitting in his car, a terrible inner battle happening inside his head, and then he decided that he didn't have a choice, anyway - whatever you fear, you'll have to face it one day, so you might as well face it _now_ ; waiting until you are ready is pointless, because that way, you'll keep saying to yourself that you aren't ready forever. That was something he had once heard his mother tell his little brother, and he sometimes remembered it when he felt like the only good thing to do was to turn on his heel and get lost forever. Ironically enough, he had only ever needed to think of those words in situations regarding Effie, like when he kept telling himself he wasn't ready to kiss her at that bar, and later, that he wasn't ready for love, for marriage, for a happier life... right now, he wasn't ready to face her.

But did he have a choice?

Haymitch parked the car in the garage and walked through the door that connected the garage with kitchen. A tasty smell of grilled meat, chocolate and wine hit his nose, soft jazz music was playing as a background and she was standing there with her back on him, scrubbing the counter, wearing a powder pink pencil dress he'd never seen on her before, turning to look at him when she heard his footsteps.

"Hi," Effie beamed at him and dried her hands in a dishtowel.

"Hey," he responded slowly and put his briefcase at the stool by the center island. "You were cooking?"

"I made dinner," she said, wrapping her arms around his neck and taking his lower lip between her own, painted red. He reacted automatically, his hands shot to her hips and he bowed his head slightly to grant her better access since she was a lot shorter than him even in her louboutins. The kiss was slow and seductive, she tasted like wine, smelled sweet and was so warm and he didn't want to stop her, though he knew he should. After a while, she pulled back herself, a smirk plastered on her smug face. "And there may be a surprise or two."

He nodded dumbly and let her lead him to their dining room. The huge mahogany table was decorated with lit up candles, she used her favourite china (that was always too afraid to use because it was too delicate for him) and a bottle of champagne was rested in a silver bowl filled with ice. She must have been working on this the entire evening, he realized. There was a salomon, a salad, and a chocolate dip with strawberries served in a deep glass plate. He shook his head slowly, and Effie giggled softly and embraced him from behind, pressing a kiss to his shoulder. "I thought we could have a nice evening. I had a hard day today, and I'm sure you did, too."

"You didn't have to do all this," he told her, taken aback, "we could have just ordered something."

"No, we couldn't have, because we deserve something nice, something _proper_." She sat on one end of the table and he followed her example, settling down opposite her. "Wine?"

Haymitch may have craved a drink more than anything in the world, but he decided that he had to stay as sober as possible tonight. His desire once again won over his common sense, though. "Yeah, just a little bit."

She poured them two glasses of red wine and handed him his. The glasses clinked as they brushed them against each other's and then they both took a sip. "So, how was New York today?" Effie asked with an easy interest and started eating.

"It was okay," Haymitch said, hoping it didn't sound too suspicious. She was acting so clueless - it felt like any other evening. They didn't do it so much anymore, but they used to have dinners like this more often. It was nice, she had always tried to be the best wife she could, even though he was sometimes a bit of a sucker of a husband, and a candle-lit dining room, wine and Effie with that beatiful smile of hers waiting for him was something he adored coming back to. This wasn't like the old times, but he wisely chose to play along. _Calm and sober._ "Busy. Crowded."

"And the lecture, did it go well?" she sipped the wine again.

"Yeah," he shrugged, "but I'm getting tired of it. Kids are trouble."

"They're not kids, Haymitch," Effie laughed softly, "they're _adults_."

He rolled his eyes. "Then tell them to behave like ones."

They ate in a comfortable silence for a while. Every time he looked up from his plate, he caught her eyes and she gave him a small smile. That smile could usually always drum up butterflies in his stomach, but it only gave him cramps today. Suddenly, he felt sick. "How were _you_?"

"Oh, I had a great day!" she exclaimed. "Work ended earlier today, so I went shopping with Portia. I bought this dress."

Haymitch smirked. "It's nice."

"You wouldn't have noticed if I didn't tell you," she accused him jokingly and they exchanged amused looks. He missed this - the banter, the jokes. It was easy to fall for it.

"Where did you buy it?" he asked.

" _Kendals_ ," she replied with a wide smile, "have you ever been there?"

He almost choked on a tomato. Effie's eyes were twinkling with amusement at his reaction. His own eyes hardened. "No," he said, "I've never been there."

"It's in front of the new hotel," Effie continued and got up suddenly, which startled him. He glanced up at her and she scowled lightly and picked up her empty plate. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," he affirmed her and handed her his plate. "I think I'm finished."

She took it and turned around with a wink. "It's time for dessert."

When she disappeared into the kitchen, he emptied his glass and poured himself another one. Effie came back and sat down. "Easy on the wine, darling," she advised him light-heartedly and set two small white bowls at their places.

Haymitch considered that a good advice for once.

She served them both a bowl full of strawberries and handed him a long, thin fork. He watched her as she dipped the fruit in the melted chocolate and brought it to her lips, gifting him with a flash of a seductive smile and a flutter of her eyelashes. Haymitch moved a bit on his chair. Now _was not the time_. He chose to catch up with the conversation instead. "So, you went to _Kendals_ today, huh?"

"Yes, with Portia," Effie confirmed. "We were in one of the tallest floors and there is a balcony. I hate heights, but-"

"You hate heights?"

She blinked. "Yes. You didn't know that?"

Of course. Effie hated heights. She also hated blood, closed spaces, insects and being home alone, but she somehow never locked the door when he was away at night.

"I did, sorry," he said and put down his fork that was uselessly howering in the air, as the little bits of apetite had officially left him. "Why did you go there, then?"

"Portia insisted I _had_ to see the view. You could see a lot of things from there. Do you know what's in the adjoining building?"

"Yeah?"

"They sell mostly home decorations there," Effie told him. "So I also bought us new curtains."

He looked over his shoulder. The windows were framed by bright red curtains that he previously didn't notice - maybe she did have a point - and that combined with the light green painting of the dining room looked weird to him. "I don't like them," he said.

She narrowed her eyes. He didn't know if it was him lowkey telling her their new curtains were hideous, or what it was that set her off - but the mood in the house had shifted.

Haymitch understood what she was doing when she picked up the wine bottle as if to pour herself another glass, and in the process, she tried to avoid the bowl with champagne in the center of the table, which meant she had to hold the bottle in the air next to the table for a few seconds; it slipped out of her fingers, and just a hundreth later, his own were wrapped around it - her eyes went cold and he wasn't sure who initiated it, but suddenly they both got up so fast the chairs flew away behind them, and before he collected himself, she, sitting closer to the door, was in the hall.

"Come back!" he yelled at her and followed her. His long strides were supposed to be a good match to her tiny high-heeled steps, but she was running in them as if it was the most natural thing to do. He caught up with her when she attempted to reach the front door and wrapped his arms around her waist from behind. "Effie-"

"Let go!" she elbowed him. It took him by surprise, but he didn't let go of her, clasping her in his vice-like grip.

"Calm down-"

She stamped at his foot with her high heel and he relaxed his grip enough for her to turn around and _fucking_ backslap him with much more strenght he thought she was capable of, his head fell to one side for a bit and she escaped his hold. He tried to reach for her arm but she was way faster than he expected her to be. Ignoring the stinging pain in his foot, he followed her. She was in the garage, already in her car, starting the engine while the garage door was slowly rolling up.

"Come back, Effie!" he shouted and tried to approach the car, but Effie was already backing towards the driveway, and drove out before he managed to. He ran out of the garage and towards the road, trying to block her way. "Effie, just get the hell out of the car and talk to me!"

"Move," she snapped at him.

"Eff-"

She depressed the pedal, going straight at him - he was walking backwards, hands in the air in a peaceful sign, but she simply went faster and he didn't have any other joice than to jump out of her car's way with a curse. He got up and looked after it - she was already too far away. For a second, he considered getting into his car and following her - after all, he knew where to find her now - but he was too unstable to do that now. He didn't think it was a good idea for them to meet - besides, she'd turn him away, anyway.

The only thing he knew was that he needed to get out of there as fast as he could.

Then, it occured to him.

All the pieces were falling into place...

* * *

 _Well. x_


	5. Chapter 5

'Effie and Haymitch's marriage doesn't really differ from any other seven years long marriage. They got together young and stayed together through both worse and better, and now they're slowly drifting apart. And like all married people, they have their secrets, and it turns out they might not know each other as well as they thought - at all. | Hayffie Mr. & Mrs. Smith AU'

* * *

Chapter V.

 _i._

 _The chapel was quiet. Too quiet - Haymitch could hear his own heart beating, resonating from the white-painted walls and shappy lino with a wooden motive. So this was it? This was how it was supposed to be? He couldn't believe he had gotten himself into this. His very first instinct was to run like hell and never look back, but it was way too late for that, so he just tugged at the uncomfortably tight black tie around his neck and took a deep breath._

 _It wasn't as though they were planning on waking up one day and putting a ring on it. He wasn't husband material and she wasn't that eager to drag him to the altar, because they were perfectly happy just the way they were. But his orders only allowed him to stay in the West Coast for so long, and when he realized that in a few weeks, it might be all over, well..._

* * *

 _He had considered that option, too. Actually, that was the very first option he considered. They have been togehter for what, seven months? It wasn't exactly a long-term relationship. It wasn't exactly a serious relationship, either. Or, at least, that's what he kept telling himself. Him and Chaff had a rented apartment in Los Angeles where she stayed for some time, and when her semester started, she moved back to Denver, where he willingly followed her. They were basically living together at her place, quite happy to act like a normal couple in their late twenties and early thirties. They went grocery shopping every Saturday, had pancakes on Sundays, put up with each other's annoying habits that they purposefully overlooked, too caught up in each other._

 _While she was at school, he was working on finishing the longest case he had up to date, while pretending he was remotely finishing his degree. As time progressed, they had become a solid unit. Him and her have become_ them _. What started out as a summer fling to kill his time and get some distraction has developed into a full-on relationship (she had proceeded to officially call him her_ boyfriend _everytime she introduced him to someone, and insisted on him calling her his_ girlfriend _, too)._

 _Maybe it was because she has awaken something in him he didn't even know that was there, anymore. Something so raw, real. Maybe it was because her eyes had always made him feel like he was floating in the sky, so blue, so beautiful, so soft, but also full of life. Maybe it was just because she was good in bed and he had been lonely for too long. That was what his cynical mind was up for. However, when he told her he might have to leave soon, she simply nodded and told him that she understood, but it was obvious she was heartbroken,_ hurt _. And so maybe it was the fact that he was terrified when he realized two things - hurting her was something he simply couldn't force himself to do, even if it was inevitable; and that the thought of losing her for good was too painful for him to even mess around with the idea._

 _So one day, he brought up a trip to Las Vegas and the rest was history._

 _A creek of the door caught his attention. Haymitch looked up to see Chaff, also in a tux, with a huge smile plastered all over his face, and it was hard to tell whether it was a happy or a mocking one. However, when he walked up to Haymitch and hugged him tightly, patting his shoulder as he pulled back, there was a hint of pride in his eyes._

 _"Thanks for coming," Haymitch muttered, which prompted his best friend to laugh out loud._

 _"Did you really think I'd miss this?" Chaff shook his head. "Haymitch Abernathy is getting_ fucking _married. I_ can't believe _this, buddy."_

 _Haymitch sneered. "Me neither."_

 _"You nervous?"_

 _He shrugged. "A little."_

 _"Here you are!"_

 _A man that could be aged anything from mid-thirties to late sixties entered the ceremonial room through a door that was leading to the back of the chapel. Both Haymitch and Chaff couldn't help but stare - sure, the West was weird and Las Vegas was fucked up, but still, the sight in front of them was a bit dicky. The man had blue hair pulled back in a voluminous ponytail and their color matched his lipstick and glittery suit. He was smiling in an overwhelming fashion, his teeth white enough to blind you for a split of a second. His theatrical gestures matched his odd appearance._

 _"Welcome!" he gripped Haymitch's hand and then Chaff's. "I'm Caesar Flickerman, it's so good to have someone here again! How long have you been together, if I may ask?"_

 _"Seven months," said Haymitch, the man's enthusiasm making him a tad concerned. Was everybody here high all the time, or what?_

 _Caesar clapped his hands. "I see why you chose this place. Don't worry, no one is judging here! Especially not a lovely couple like you two. Now, let's get-"_

 _Chaff snorted loudly as he tried to supress the laughter and Haymitch closed his eyes briefly. "It's not_ us _who's getting married," Chaff clarified in amusement. "My friend here is waiting for his girl."_

 _"Oh, I see," Caesar recovered and smiled brightly. "What are the names, if I may ask? Also, do you have your own vows or do you want to say the universal ones?"_

 _Haymitch didn't really give it much care, however, his fianceé had thought about everything. "Haymitch and Effie. And we've got our own."_

 _Someone cleared their throat and they all looked in the direction of the sound. Portia, in a mint green dress and a black coat, was slowly opening the front door. Behind her, Haymitch saw her. She was slowly walking to the altar, her eyes only for him and his own only for her. She was beautiful, she was wearing a short lacy white dress with a puffy skirt and long sleeves, her hair was made in waves and pinned up in the back, a few lone strands framing her face, and in both of her hands she was holding a bouquet of white roses. He couldn't look away, she was gorgeous and he was struggling for every breath. He never knew he could want someone that much._

 _Chaff glanced at him in amusement and Portia, who joined Chaff in the pew, gifted him with a wide smile, but Haymitch didn't notice them. Everything he cared about was right in front of him - he gave out his arm and she wrapped her fingers around his biceps and let him lead her through the few final steps. Then they found themselves at the altar and he looked at her, her eyes sparkling with emotion._

 _"You're beautiful," he whispered roughly._

 _Effie grinned and gripped his arm tighter. "You don't look bad, yourself."_

 _Haymitch smirked and finally tore his eyes away from her. Caesar has already stepped behind the little altar and greeted Effie with a smile, then nodded towards their little audience. "We have come here today to witness the entry into marriage of Effie and Haymitch, a beautiful young couple - especially the bride looks magnificent," he nodded at Effie and she returned the birght smile happily. "If I am right, they have some vows to say and promises to make."_

 _"Haymitch," Effie started softly, eyes full of tenderness that sent shivers down his spine, "when we met, I didn't know that the man who kissed me because he lost a bet and mouthed back at me the entire evening was going to become my husband one day. I've never suspected that, and if somebody told me I'd fall in love this way, I would just laugh at them. But life is unpredictable and I found the love of my life in someone who makes me the happiest and the saddest woman in the world at the same time, every minute of each day, and I wouldn't have it any other way. You are frustrating, and don't see into your own mouth, you are complicated. And you have such a good heart. All you want in this world is justice for everything and everyone. I admire it, and how you always stand up for what is right, no matter the cost. You teach me something new every day, and I don't have to act like I am anything more than just myself when I am with you. You help me become better everyday. That is just some of the reasons why I want to be with you, why I want to cross my path with yours and then go down a common one for the rest of our lives."_

 _Effie's eyes were shining by the time she got to this part and there was an ugly lump in his throat he couldn't manage to swallow away, so he simply tightened his grip on her hand to encourage her to continue._

 _"I promise to give you my all, my loyalty, my trust, my protection, my unconditional love, for both worse and better, in sickness and in health, for the rest of eternity, till death do us part."_

 _It was Haymitch's turn and he had to clear his throat before starting. "Effie... you are one hell of a challenge. I- sorry, we're in a chapel. It's not even a real chapel, so, whatever. You know I suck at all of this," he smirked and she laughed and hit his arm playfully, "but you deserve to hear it. When I first saw you, I knew you had something nobody else in the world has. I don't know how you do it, and I didn't know it would lead to this, but I knew I couldn't just walk away the morning after. You have something that always brings me back to you, you have something I need, for whatever reason. I don't know what it is. Maybe it's how beautiful you look when you are mad at me, which is quite often. Maybe it's how damn easy it is to_ make _you angry. You've got guts, you can handle yourself, you let me know every day that I'm a dick, and you also make want to not be one for you. Whatever happens with the rest of the world, I just want you to be fine." He just wanted it to be over already. "So I promise to give you my all, my loyalty, my trust, my protection, my unconditional love, for both worse and better, in sickness and in health, for the rest of eternity, till death do us part."_

 _Caesar, totally lost in his emotions, as if he wasn't used to it by now, turned to Effie. "Effie, do you take Haymitch for your rightful husband?"_

 _"I do," she said, biting on her lip to supress the wide grin spreading her lips, unsuccesfully._

 _"Haymitch, do you take Effie for you rightful wife?"_

 _This was it. He could_ still _get out of it. He could still tear that damn tie off his neck, get out of his tux, run through the door and prevent his stupid ass from doing something there was no graceful way back from. Not that this variant was graceful - but he'd still rather play the runaway bride and break Effie's heart now than do it later, when everything would hurt twice as much. That was just a thought, though - just something his brain, so afraid of commitment, and his heart, too scared of having something to care for so deeply again, were coming up with. It maybe really wasn't that late, but... he was too stuck. Leaving now would be the cowardly thing to do, and he was tired of being a coward._

 _It was time to learn to live again, and if this woman was a way for him to gain some of his old self back and to finally have a shot at a happier life, despite everything he had to put up with everyday, if she was his chance at having a home and someone to give all the affection and love he had frozen inside him for so long, burnt too many times to have the guts to offer it to anyone, then so be it._

 _"I do" he said, and he was surprised how at ease he felt with it. He had always imagined this moment as feeling like being given an iron ball at his feet, while in reality, at that very moment, it felt like a mountain had fallen off his shoulders._

 _Caesar clapped his hands again. "You may now kiss the bride."_

 _Haymitch leant in, his palm cupping Effie's cheek before craddling the back of her neck, and pressed his lips against hers hard. She responded, deepened the kiss and wrapped her arms around his neck as his own lifted her from the ground and held her against him tightly. Overwhelmed by the smell of roses from her bouquet and her own scent, a combination of flowery perfume and citrus shampoo, he realized that he didn't want to let go of her, ever, with the skin of her bare back so soft beneath his calloused fingers and her warmth being something so familiar that its absence sent his body into a paralyzed state while its presence sent his mind into overdrive. When the kiss ended, he carefully put her back down, one look at her face giving away the fact that she had started to tear up. He gently brushed one tear away with his thumb which prompted a happy giggle._

 _"My parents are going to kill me," she said, obviously not bothered by that at all as her eyes lingered on her ring._

 _"Your parents can kiss my ass," he muttered and kissed her forehead before taking her hand in his again and turning to Chaff, who showed Haymitch a thumb up, and Portia, who was smiling wildly and her own eyes were sparkling._

 _He put his arms over her shoulders and pulled her close to him while the acceptance settled down - he was married, and to the best girl that was out there -, and let himself slowly realize that with her by her side, nothing felt as terrifying. This was their chance. A chance that it would be plain insanity to let go without a fight. It was the beginning of a new life for the both of them, a life they had both hoped to be long-lasting._

 _Preferably,_ till death do them part.

 _ii._

Effie had cried herself to sleep the previous night and she woke up aching all over. The sleeping pills she used were still messing with her, so when she tried to go at least make herself some coffee, she couldn't even get up, so she just lied on the sofa, staring into the ceiling. When she woke up this morning, she was so, so relieved - she hoped it was just a bad dream, that it was just a nightmare, and then she opened her eyes and realized where she was, and everything crashed down at once.

Not many people knew, but it was difficult to keep something like this secret. Portia and Cinna promised to be discreet and she was grateful, but there wasn't a way to truly help her now. Her whole life has just fallen apart, all thanks to the _worst coincidence ever_. She didn't have the strenght to truly live those emotions, but she was half-berserk with anger and betrayal.

He was an enemy, as if the fact that their whole lives were just a big, fat lie, wasn't already bad enough.

She was supposed to talk to someone from the direction, but she wasn't ready. There would be staring, there would be questions. She didn't know what to tell anyone - she didn't know anything. The only thing she _did_ know was that Haymitch was a rival who was apparently assigned to the very same case at her, and then tried to kill her. She didn't know whether he realized who he was shooting at before or after it happened; she could believe that he saw her in the last second, because there was two of them and they only shot at Portia. He probably would have killed her during the dinner, though she knew that if he truly wanted to hurt her right there, he wouldn't have let her go so easily. But that didn't matter. They needed to see each other, talk about it, but... something told her that there wasn't much to talk about.

They were on opposite sides, with the same target, and had tried to kill each other, without much success. That wasn't something they could just brush off.

But what was she supposed to do?

The answer to this obvious question came in the form of Portia, whose soft steps Effie didn't even hear on the fluffy pink carpet, and who walked in with a laptop and some kind of quiet fear engraved in her features. "Effie?"

"Yes?" she wiped her face with her sleeve hastily, though she knew Portia wouldn't have commented on her red eyes and huge circles under them anyway.

Portia hesitated, then handed her the laptop. "It's Snow."

Effie knew that this moment would come and she was too terrified, too tired, too angry to face it, but, and that was even worse, she couldn't just put it aside either. She couldn't just ignore this, go back to sleep and pretend nothing ever happened, despite how much she wanted to. She had to accept it, she had to take a grasp on it and hold tight onto the harsh reality, she needed to look at it from a certain perspective and understand it.

Her husband had tried to kill her.

She had tried to kill him.

They have ruined each other's missions, because they didn't know it was them they were supossed to get rid of.

Now there were consequences to face and choices to make and before she did anything, she needed to speak to Snow, though she knew what he was about to tell her. She knew what he was going to ask from her. And she knew she wasn't going to do it and she needed a way to make things alright without having to go through yesterday's horrors again.

Her friend disappeared behind the glass doors and left her there with nothing but the laptop from which's screen he was watching her with his snake-like eyes, dark and hard even when his face was speaking of a certain empathy.

"Miss Trinket," Snow greeted her, his voice disorted through the speakers, "this isn't the best opporturnity to speak to you again."

"No." Her eyes were burning and she was afraid of the tears that were threating to fall down her face. Not now. _Not now_.

"I didn't even know what you are married," he told her and let his lips curve into an ingenuine smile. "This might surprise you, but I know Mr. Abernathy."

"What?" she snapped. "How could you know him?"

"I have asked him to come over to our company. To start working for us, and he had declined every time. I _never_ would have guessed this. This situation is the product of my carelessness. I cannot phatom what it feels like to know that I have missed something so important, but you two sure know how to keep a secret." He shook his head slightly, then tilted it as if pretending to be evaluating the possibilites, already decided on one. "Miss Trinket, you have always had my unconditional trust. You have a keen instinct. I bet that that instinct is telling you the same thing that I am about to tell you. Your husband, however he has my respect, is an enemy. And enemies need to be eliminated. I believe that you will do the right thing."

Effie's mind softened but her body tensed. Her own words sounded strange to her, like her voice wasn't her voice and the brain that came up with them wasn't part of the same body that her heart was. "The right thing?"

Snow took his time before answering. He was scanning her face and by his expression, she could tell that she was far from her best appearance, with eyes tortured from crying and a night of no sleep, with her forehead wrinkled in the fear she was failing to hide. And she didn't care. He didn't, either. There was very little that could possibly make him feel sorry for her, or to have any mercy at all. His conclusion was not surprising. It was, however, shattering. "Yes, the right thing. Miss Trinket, you have been living with him for even years. Sharing home with him. You have always had my trust and I am sure you wouldn't want to lose it now, because as much as I don't want it to, there is this doubt creeping on my mind. He is a rival, and I am sure you understand that despite you are one of my best employees, you can never be sure in people. You have your experience with that."

"Are you implying that I knew?" She curled her hands into fists to try and control the wave of grievance that was about to take over her reason.

"The only thing that I am implying is that you _still_ have a job to do and a mission to finish." The speakers rattled briefly. "It's simple, though it may look like it's not."

"It's my _husband_ we are talking about here!" She knew that this wasn't wise, and again, she didn't give a damn. "What do you mean by _the right thing_? I'm not-"

"Miss Trinket," Snow interrupted her, slowly running out of patience, "it's your husband, _and_ your enemy we are talking about here."

"He isn't my _enemy_." She was shaking and her vision was already blurred. _Not now. Not now. Not now_. "You don't mean it. You can't make me do that."

"I know this is hard for you, but you need to accept it for what it is," his voice was calm but stern. _No mercy_. "Your husband IS an enemy now. He has attacked you _and_ made you fail your mission, and everyone who assaults a member of our company, or ruins a chance at accomplishing your task, is considered just that. If you have any loyalty to us, and any good judgement at all, you are going to do the right thing and finish this mission without a fuss."

She was vaguely aware of shaking her head and wiping the tears away hastily. She had already showed too much weakness. She couldn't afford that. _Not now_. "I could resign. I could do anything else. Not this."

"Do you think that _he_ is begging for your life right now?" It was cruel and it was a low-blow and it was also very much true. "Let me reassure you, Miss Trinket, that he _isn't_. And neither should be you. Of course it's not easy, but the person we are talking about here is _not_ your husband. He is second to nothing more but a stranger you happen to be married to and who you have never really known. You are going to follow the orders. For the sake of yourself, and everyone you love. If you love him, too, you will end matters as quickly as possible. If you refuse, I must inform you he is going to die, anyway, and you might get yourself into a very uncomfortable position. And we wouldn't want that, would we?"

"No," she whispered harshly and closed her eyes.

"Do we understand each other?"

"Yes." Effie cleared her throat. "I understand everything."

Snow nodded when Effie opened her eyes, hard and emotionless. "I'm glad that you are so smart, Miss Trinket. I was afraid I would have to dig deeper, and remind you what happens to people who refuse to do their job. Seneca Crane, for example. Your good friend. He was there before your husband, wasn't he?"

She loured as the mention of that name stung in her chest. "It's... long gone."

"And so is he." Snow smiled contently. "You have fourty-eight hours."

The call ended abruptly, and Effie sat there, staring at the black screen, without a trace of some proper emotion. The world was spinning with her, the realization settling down...

She gasped for air.

What _in the world_ is she going to do?

She heard Portia's footsteps. "So?"

There was, in fact, only one thing she could do.

"Dial Haymitch," Effie said sharply, nails digging into the flesh of her palms. Her heart was beating faster and faster as the anger grew. "We're having a date."

 _iii._

"So you are saying that you didn't know?"

The silence in the room, the heavy atmosphere in the whole place, one could cut it how thick it was; one would shiver at how it felt. Like building a house of cards in a full-blown whirlwind; like striking a match next to a vessel filled to the brim with gasoline. Nobody knew what to say to make it feel better. Nobody knew what to do to change it. Nobody knew what to do, period.

And Haymitch didn't know what to think; it was too much information to process at once. There were so many things he should be feeling - disbelief, anger, betrayal, fear. And he was feeling them all at once, feeling nothing in the end. He just wanted to drink himself into oblivion and never have to wake up again.

Of course, it would be pure hypocrisy to blame her for lying to him. They had created whole fake lives for themselves and then joined them and let it become one huge lie. Haymitch didn't know where the truth ended and where the lie started, how much of what she had told him was made up and how much of it was real. He himself never told her much about him. She always said the past didn't matter - that what mattered was present and future. _Their_ future. But the past _did_ matter now, no matter how unconvinient it was for them.

Eight years of lies... it was almost ridiculous, he'd certainly find it just that if it wasn't him, if it wasn't his wife, if it wasn't so fucking serious. Because it _was_ serious. And he had no idea where to move next.

There weren't that many choices left for him - he had to find her and talk to her. It was so weird - he was thinking of her, and he still saw the same woman he saw eight years ago. He had a problem comparing her to someone who was hired to shoot people from rooftops and could beat his ass like it was nothing. He had a problem seeing her as a rival... as a traitor.

Haymitch didn't want to think of her like that, but she _was_ an enemy. Not in his eyes, but in the eyes of everyone else.

"No," he confirmed. "I didn't know it."

A flame flickered in Coin's eyes that have been unreadable up until now. She moved her hand across the ebony table, stroking the polished surface, and slowly leaned back against her leather-coated chair. "I see."

"What am I supposed to do?" His voice was rough and slow when it escaped his throat. He knew how he looked - his shoulders down, hair falling into his face in messy strands, face disorted in the poorly hidden despair. His knuckles were white from gripping the armrest so hard, but if he didn't, he probably would have fallen apart already. He felt sick of everything.

"You know what you are supposed to do."

He did. He... expected it. That's what Johanna told him. " _She fired at you and made you ruin the mission_ ," she spat, " _you know how it works._ " No one has showed him much empathy.

But he couldn't.

He simply couldn't. Period.

"No," he growled as his heartbeat took up pace. "I need to talk to her. I have to."

She shook her head, slowly, but resolutely. "There will be no talking. It needs to be quick and-"

" _Stop_ ," he hit the table. The glass filling in the table's covered shelves trembled. Coin's eyebrows shot up. "Stop. Stop this. You don't-"

"Mr. Abernathy," she hissed, "this is my _order_. You know how I respect you, you know that over all these years, I have made a lot of concessions for your sake, but this is my ultimate and bulletproof _order_. I understand that it's hard for you-"

" _Hard?_ " He was shaking all over. " _Hard?_ You don't understand-"

"-she is a _threat_ ," Coin's voice battled his own. "She is a threat not only to _you_ , but to _all of us_. CAPITOL has no mercy and it's time we learn to not have any as well."

"No. _No_. She's no threat, she's my _wife_ -"

"It's going to be you." She got up. "I am ending this discussion. You have fourty-eight hours. You know what happens if you defy."

He felt so stupid for begging. He just needed time. That must have been understandable - time to process it, time to figure out what other possibilities there were left. He had fourty-eight hours starting right now which meant he had two days to make it alright. He needed to talk to her, that was all. He needed to know why things happened the way they happened and if there was a way to prevent it. He needed to tell her that he was sorry for keeping this away from her and partly being responsible for this situation.

What else was there to come? They were going to get divorced and the companies' rivalry would only get worse, given how dificult it was to keep a secret here, but it was also a way. They could talk things through, nobody would be a threat to anyone, this was one huge mistake that they couldn't fix, overlook, or take back, but they could make a deal - after all, she was still just Effie to him. He had a hard time imagining her as someone who was hired to shoot people from the rooftops. She was gentle. She was silly. She was a lot of things he disliked combined in such a dosage that made him love them.

But he knew that it wasn't really her, and that was the problem. Because he didn't know she was. Because it was all a nightmare he couldn't drink away.

There was only one way this could go, only one thing he could do.

One thing he couldn't do.

The door creaked half-open. A petite dark-haired woman stood there uncertainly, pale eyes flicking from Coin to Haymitch. She didn't walk in, only her torso creaping from behind the heavy door, fingers tapping on the wooden panels.

"Mr. Abernathy had a call," she told them, "it was some Miss Trinket. She said that she'll be at your old spot, tonight, at seven."

"Thank you, Trish." Coin's sharp voice was hiding a farewell, and the woman disappeared behind the door again. "You do know what this means, don't you?"

"She wouldn't hurt me," he lashed out, blood boiling, hands shaking, "we're just gonna talk-"

"If it wasn't so serious..." She inhaled sharply, as if to stop herself from the flood of words that were threatening to spill and flood the void of uncertainity, which has become Haymitch's only _certainity_. Her eyes fluttered close briefly, she looked like she was counting something in her head, like she was comparing and calculating and finally, she had come to a result. She opened her eyes again, hard as stone and cold as ice. They were speaking of something that was already decided. They were defininte. "Talk to her. If you manage to come to an arrangement, the orders are invalid. Your immediate cut of any strings attatched to your wife is a matter of course. Either way, once all of this is over, you are going to go to a three-month leave until everything is settled. I want her dead or a proper deal. _You have fourty-eight hours_."

His throat felt like it had been convulsed. There would be words to say, but there wasn't a way to let them out. He wanted to thank her for giving him a chance, the only and last chance he would ever get. He wanted to say a lot. However, words were no use now. He needed to act. _Now_.

Dinner at their old spot at seven. No wonder that she picked that place. It was her favorite restaurant in the whole city and just a few days ago, she complained about how long they haven't been there. She was pushing and pulling even now.

Despite his misery, he had to shake his head in amusement.

This... this was going to be a wild ride.

* * *

Author's note: Hey there! After trying things like writing ahead, writing all week for an update, and not writing at all, I have decided to update each story every two weeks. Today is an odd week, which I'm going to generally dedicate to _Till Death Do Us Part_ , while even weeks are for _If This Was A Movie_. I'm going to post both today, though, because I haven't updated anything in a really long time which I feel bad about; but I'm sure every (not only) fanfic writer can relate, because time is precious when you're in school and the effort put into brainstorming, writing and editing actually takes a lot of it, so I don't write until I'm 100% in the mood for it - it's supposed to be fun, not another obligation. Sooo, I hope you enjoyed it, if you're a _If This Was A Movie_ stan, then stay tuned for later, and have a nice day, everyone!


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